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Post by E on May 31, 2009 22:25:52 GMT -5
Rise of the Lycans
Beautiful film, good casting, tied in with the "sequels" well and overall a good film. I would have been a little disappointed had we seen it in theatre though. Only because it didn't reveal anything we didn't already know, just put it in visual form. My imagination did that. Anyway, it was good.
B
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Post by Denethor on Jun 1, 2009 18:08:45 GMT -5
Right now I have Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow playing. Good eye candy but not much substance...good for background when I'm working (or surfing the net) and I can just look up for the "good parts".
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Post by Denethor on Jun 5, 2009 22:12:15 GMT -5
Sorry to reply to myself, but, tonight I made a bold escape from the Realtors' Dungeon to go see the new Star Trek movie as planned. I'd give it at least a B (grade lowered from what appeared to be a glaring logical flaw - common where time travel appears in films - but I can't go into detail because this forum lacks "spoiler" tags) with the proviso that it should be viewed on a nice big screen. The younger Kirk, Spock, et al were excellent. I liked what they did with McCoy - too often in the old show he was just a sort of comic foil for Spock, and here he seemed more fleshed out. (The fact that he was played by someone who will always be Eomer from LotR kind of couldn't be helped, but they did pretty well anyway). Major aside alert...I have had an odd relationship with Star Trek. When I reached the age when one leaves the parental home, and goes off to live among the savages known as one's college peers, with little privacy and a host of seemingly arbitrary social codes, the way I handled it was to completely shut down in the emotions department. I became Spock. I did so well at being a Vulcan, in fact, that at one time I was diagnosed with flat affect disorder - a sometime manifestation of depression, characterized by lack of emotional response. It worked well for me. For years. Fast forward to 1996. Graduate school. My mother gets diagnosed with this brain tumor. Brain tumor is one of the weirdest and most terrifying illnesses imaginable. Bizarre changes occur in the patient, and it is near impossible for family (or clinicians) to suss out what changes are the results of coping with a terrible disease, and what changes are due to the brain disease itself. In my mother's case, the thing ate her emotions. As in, the portion of her brain that generated emotions, died. She became a real Vulcan. (The fact that her looks were a little Spockish, didn't help). Now one of the mystical teachings I have encountered over the years is that the will is in fact an emotion - it is generated by the same engine that produces what in this culture are labeled emotions. I believe it, because, you see, I have actual "experimental" evidence of same. What happens to someone with no emotions? Nothing. Or everything. What doesn't happen is the individual generating any behavior him/her self. My mother would basically just sit there, and often wouldn't respond when spoken to because there was no reason to. Not no "logical" reason. No reason. Ditto for, erm, going to the bathroom. No emotions means one is not, shall we say, easily embarrassed. Changed my view on approaching life as a "Vulcan" right away. Incidentally, I've noticed some "retooling" of this culture in the Star Trek universe over the years, some attempts to make them more like Buddhists, say, or more like what New Age culture calls "enlightened", or what have you. But non-attachment is not emotionlessness, nor is it the only ideal of these real cultures. Emotionlessness is a sort of chemical equilibrium, and another term for chemical equilibrium in the biochemical universe is death. It is not the same thing as imperturbability, mental peace, serenity or any of that - these states are more in the range of positive emotions than absence of emotion. And retooling the "alien" culture to look more like the Inscrutable Asian - itself a nasty stereotype - is kind of a cop-out. So I retooled my ideal to more fit the real world. I'm for balance, a happy medium between "having no emotions" (death) and the let it all hang out hippy thing. I'll never be the latter - I still have trouble where when I smile, I often am not smiling as much as I think I am, and others miss it - but at least I am not Spock. Or my mom. Loved her dearly, treasure her memory, but I prefer to remember her whole. That's not to say the Vulcans aren't cool on the big (or small) screen, just that we don't want to actually be like them in real life. Nor is it "healthier" to be more like that than like something else. OK that was a big digression. But hey, no one is coming to this board that often any more anyway! Anyone see any other newer movies recently? *Quietly expects a response by about 2012*
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Post by blackrose on Jun 6, 2009 11:10:51 GMT -5
My only brief comment would be that I always thought it was pretty clear that we weren't meant to be like Vulcans, considering all the trouble Spock always got into by denying his emotions... the way he was always sort of pitied, sort of... and how his character, through the years, always became more "human" in that way. I liked that they sort of created him as more conflicted in this movie - tho I think they went a bit overboard in some places. I also liked the relationship between him and Uhura - although there's some discussion about the appropriatness of it on the goodreads thread about the movie. Not so much whether it's appropriate for his character (tho there's some of that), but the fact that Nyota was his student and below him in the chain of command - both things which are generally seen as no-nos... (Of course, no one ever mentions the general inappropriateness of Kirk in the entirity of the original series, but hey... it's ok for him to get his jollies, just not poor Spock, apparently ) ** spoilers ** There are some major flaws with the, erm, logic of the movie. My least favorite part being the overly convenient meeting between Kirk, Old Spock and Scotty on the ice planet... **end spoilers** Haven't seen any movies recently, unless you count rewatching Casino Royale last night. But it had commercials and it cut one of my favorite scenes! Bastards! I still like Casino Royale, tho I can never quite decide whether I find Daniel Craig attractive or not. It's weird... Didn't like the follow-up to it nearly as much, tho We might go see either Terminator or Drag Me to Hell this weekend...
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Post by blackrose on Jun 8, 2009 8:04:36 GMT -5
So, we decided on going to see Drag Me to Hell, but when we got there they didn't have a show for the time that I'd thought it was, so we ended up seeing Terminator Salvation instead.
It was ok. Kind of like a standard action movie, really. Seemed to be Sam Worthington's movie, almost, more than Bale's. The guy that played Kyle Reese also played Chekov - that was kinda fun.
Lot's of blow ups and bang outs... Had a nice, gritty, dystopian look to it... but, overall, not that impressed. Mighta been a bit better if one of the major plot elements hadn't've been given away in the trailers...
B/ B-
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Post by E on Jun 8, 2009 19:03:59 GMT -5
Benjamin Button
Fantastic, wonderful, amazing, spectacular, fabulous. Deinatly going on my list of favorite films of my lifetime. Right up there with Garp. Everything about this film was absolutely great.
A+
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hydra
Junior Member
Posts: 81
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Post by hydra on Jun 8, 2009 21:01:56 GMT -5
Land of the Lost
My bf and I decided to see this movie yesterday. We were looking forward to it because we both like Will Farrell and we watched the tv show this is based on as kids. Well....it is not a good movie, not even very funny, I would give it a D.
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Post by blackrose on Jun 16, 2009 10:34:29 GMT -5
The Spirit
Hard to rate this one. It was campy, and strange, and absurd... and also very funny in places. Samual L. Jackson's character was the best, and funniest. At other times the story moved a bit slow, and I would've liked the action to be played a bit less for laughs. (It mighta been better without Eva Mendes... ) More style than substance, but not a bad watch if you like 'wtf' kind of humor. It's bad... but the cheesy, fun kind of bad.
Underworld: Rise of the Lycans
Also nice to see Lucian again - and what a yummy Lycan he is - but, as E said, there's nothing new here, except the director. The visuals were nice and atmospheric. The acting was good, even if Bill Nye didn't ham it up quite as good as he did in the first movie. He did a good job, though, of being both despicable and sympathetic. Interesting to see a movie where the cast of characters all died in the first and second movies, tho. The Lycan effects were cheesy, tho. I've never been a fan of them in any of the movies, but they were clearly dudes in suits in several of the scenes here. And how come Lucian wasn't branded, considering how important that was in the first movie?
B-
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Post by blackrose on Jun 22, 2009 9:59:42 GMT -5
Drag Me to Hell
Watching this movie, you can definitely tell it's from the same guy who brought us Evil Dead and Army of Darkness. And he's just gotten better since then. At times jumping-scary, laugh-out-loud-funny, and cover-the-eyes-gross. Not for the squeamish... Probably not much in the way of rewatch value, tho, since you know'll know what's coming, which ruins most of the jump-factor. This is the type of movie that it's fun to watch while introducing to other people, tho, so you can laugh at their reactions to it. *egrin*
B+/A-
Theater viewing note: This is a PG-13 horror movie. Had I known it was PG-13 and not R, I would've gone on a weeknight. Not sure what it is about horror movies in general, but they seem to attract more people who are prone to talk throughout the entire freaking movie and/or talk to the screen. PG-13 have the addition of gaggles of teenagers texting and chatting and being generally annoying through the whole thing. Definitely a movie to see during off-peak hours.
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Post by Denethor on Jun 22, 2009 16:48:25 GMT -5
Agreed about the horror movies - they're good fun to see in the theater, but yes, the audience is always abysmal. It's always like some kind of national convention of seat-kickers, cell-phone-yakkers, snark-at-the-screen-ers, popcorn throwers, and so forth. (Incidentally, is the rumor I hear that a mortgage officer gets it in the teeth in that film correct?) Cloverfield. D+ at best. Don't blame me, I got it for Xmas or whatever holiday the gift giver thought it was celebrating and I didn't get around to watching it until the other night. Good thing I had work to do - this film was bad, we're talking Blair Witch Project bad. The monsters were cliched and the whole "someone found a camera with this video on it" idea was done to death loooong before people even started with the modern mania for capturing every damn minute in a digital video. My suspension of disbelief admittedly snaps in the slightest breeze, but even a Herculean suspension would not have held up under this plot, methinks. (Especially since the Brooklyn Bridge didn't). We've seen enough real destruction in New York the last few years that no fictional destruction will ever make anyone think anything other than "well the real one was way worse, because it was real" - which is death to the vacation from reality a good horror, fantasy, or sci-fi film requires. Next time I want a B movie I'll rent one of the classics.
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Post by blackrose on Jun 23, 2009 9:00:24 GMT -5
(Incidentally, is the rumor I hear that a mortgage officer gets it in the teeth in that film correct?) Sort of. She's a general loan officer - but the curse does revolve around an old woman's house being foreclosed.
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Post by E on Jun 30, 2009 12:44:59 GMT -5
Taken
Pretty good. The story winds together well, the characters are well casted. The struggle of split parenthood is portrayed perfectly and the emotional part of brings you in. In fact the entire film had my emotions flaming between "slap the s*** out of her!" and "Oh God how horrible".
I'll rate it solid for how well done it was in the action drama suspense categories.
B
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Post by Shannon on Jul 6, 2009 17:42:48 GMT -5
Watched the Internatioanl last night. I must have gotten my previews mixed up because I thought the storyline was going to be in a different direction. It was meh. Left me unsatisfied.
Have Doubt to watch tonight. Ben will hate it but I love me some dark and depressing dramas.
Speaking of depressing dramas, watched Rachel Getting Married awhile back and have spent way too much time analyzing the final product. I understand that indy films aren't meant to be as slick and glossy as Hollywood films. Usually it really does feel like a glimpse into someones window-at least with the drama genre. And maybe that's why it felt like they held back on RGM, because looking in you wouldn't necessarily see the big blow up fights and the intensity of the situation. It would all be under the surface and only hinted at by the participants since they're living it and don't have a story to tell. And that's what makes the drama real. But on the other hand I do feel like they held back in this movie. It was like they wanted you to know there was this huge tragedy but couldn't quite bring themselves to really hit the nerve of it. Then again, the point of the movie wasn't the tragedy but family interactions, and it would make sense that the family would hold back on touching on that travesty. And in the spirit of indy, they aren't really catering to the viewer and fitting in a nicely packaged back story.But it just wasn't real enough. It missed the mark.
And I don't care what the Academy says. They're just pushing Anne Hathaway as the next big thing, because Hollywood has lost the era of big movie stars who can open a movie on their name alone.There's too many starlets and they are all recyclable. America has lost the fascination with the glitz and glamour and doesn't have the attention span to form a connection with one. Leading person.
So I say good day to your Oscars, RGM. Good day!
(Sort of lost it there,didn't I? But that movie bugs.)
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Post by blackrose on Jul 6, 2009 20:39:09 GMT -5
I want to see 'Rachel getting married' and I still will, so there Saw 'Dune pt 1' of the miniseries. Watched '1776' for my yearly tradition and I still love it. Even Darkk likes it and he's not a big musical person. Also watched 'Dr Horrible's sing-a-long blog' which is awesomely strange and funny and touching and absurd. Also a musical - and damn, Doogie Howser can sing! The ending was kinda abrupt tho. I was sitting there waiting for something else, even during the credits. It was originally released as webisodes but you can get it on DVD now, too...
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Post by Denethor on Jul 10, 2009 15:25:33 GMT -5
Seeing the new Star Trek movie made me wax nostalgic, so I went and bought the DVD set of the II, III, and IV movies, which I knew I would one day buy anyway (just like for the Star Wars set) so now's as good a time as any. No need to grade them; is there anyone here who has not seen them? Well get out of your cave and go to Netflix! Sheesh. Made me think better of all the overtime I've been getting. Not only did the extra money enable me to buy movies (and thus help the economy! Yay!...Where's my cookie? ) but I went back to work thinking, at least no one is telling me we need warp speed in three minutes or we all die. "This is due on Monday" doesn't seem nearly so bad.
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