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Schwarzwald posted:It's one thing to have a movie where Abe Lincoln kills vampires with an axe, but it's another to have a dramatic silhouette of the man walking toward the camera--filmed at a 90' angle so he fits on the screen, or to give his axe an "alt fire." Absolutely, that silhouette shot is another memorable image in a film full of them. quote:AL:VH is a film that goes the extra mile, both in sobriety as in lunacy. It's rather Altman-esque in that regard, switching from seriously political, sincerely human and cartoonishly bonkers at a moment's notice. I think time will be kind to this film.
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Jun 28, 2012 11:20
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For AL:VH, even though the movie was entertaining I couldn't get over how a real world historical setting with tragic consequences was getting trivialized into an action movie. I understand this is supposed to be one of those movies that is pure fun and lunacy, but this movie made me feel uneasy while watching for the same reason Inglorious Basterds did. I'm not supposed to take it seriously or view it as profanity towards history but I can't help but feel like it is. The only way I could feel good about the whole thing is if it were a cleverly crafted parody that is calling on us to recognize how degraded and trivialized real violence and human suffering has become in the collective consciousness. Even then, I'd probably think that it goes way too far and only has the effect of perpetuating and spreading what it attempts to criticize. I guess it is because I took media studies in college that the knowledge of the effects of repeated trivialized violence to individuals over the long term worries me. Just because something is meant to be pure fantasy doesn't mean it doesn't have negative effects on society and the people who watch these films. This film sets a precedent - we can now go back to any event in the past retell the history in a way that includes all the tragic components but then adds bizarre nonsensical twists and includes heaps of trivialized violence. What's next, movies that go back in history and poo poo all over a colossal tragedy? These fantasy worlds of pure insanity where you can debauch anything and everything have only been truly possible in modern cinema of the past 20 or so years, and it seems a deluge of new films continue to push the limits but the audience continues to never break and asks for more. I guess I'm just a luddite and a closet Mormon who would be more at home in Sunday School. edit: I thought I'd further comment on the last point about this phenomena being 'new'. Of course someone is going to jump on me and say that there were films in the 30s doing this thing, but one important thing about violence on the screen is realism. In the last 20 years or so, it has been possible to literally recreate history to be as real as real life, such as the Gettysburg battle in AL:VH. Before the lack of realism would be present enough that there would be a degree of separation from this fictional storytelling and what actually happened in real history. In fact, that Gettysburg battle literally made me feel sick when I saw it, as did so many other incredibly realistic scenes. These were terrible events that evoke real and profound emotions but then you realize it's just being used as part of a ridiculous action movie for no reason whatsoever. It cheapens the entire experience and left me feeling like poo poo. What is the point of this? What is the point of the real Lincoln's soaring speeches in this context? They are meant to inspire us and move us, yet the context has been utterly debauched? Profane and perverse, yet undeniably entertaining sums up my thoughts of this movie. Also, feeling guilty for being entertained. CowOnCrack fucked around with this message at 07:28 on Jun 29, 2012 |
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Jun 29, 2012 07:20
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I'm seeing this argument around a lot and it does have some validity. I would argue, however, that this can be compared to something like Horrible Histories, which highlights the brutality of actual violence throughout history in an effort to pique the interest of children. In Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, we know that vampires are not real, so it stands to reason that the film is actually about Abraham Lincoln, who was real. The teachings of history are refined through fiction. The lessons are more important than the facts.
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Jun 29, 2012 10:49
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CowOnCrack posted:I understand this is supposed to be one of those movies that is pure fun and lunacy, but this movie made me feel uneasy while watching for the same reason Inglorious Basterds did. I'm not supposed to take it seriously or view it as profanity towards history but I can't help but feel like it is. Well, maybe not AL:VH, but this is basically what Inglorious Basterds did.
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Jun 29, 2012 13:07
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CowOnCrack posted:edit: I thought I'd further comment on the last point about this phenomena being 'new'. Of course someone is going to jump on me and say that there were films in the 30s doing this thing, but one important thing about violence on the screen is realism. In the last 20 years or so, it has been possible to literally recreate history to be as real as real life, such as the Gettysburg battle in AL:VH. Before the lack of realism would be present enough that there would be a degree of separation from this fictional storytelling and what actually happened in real history. I don't know, we may be underestimating how realistic things seemed to those audiences. When you go back and look at the first CGI it is hilariously fake. The puppets and practical effects before that? Also pretty drat fake. Early colour films? Grainy and fake. The first talkies? Terrible sound quality. The first motion pictures? Hah, mimes are more convincing. Looking backwards, films have just now with the advent of high def finally become realistic enough to warp viewers perceptions of reality. On the other hand, I remember being astonished by the lifelike graphics in video games starting in the 1980s.  Some of those old Sierra adventure games were amazing, not quite lifelike, but like a beautiful painting. Gradually becoming more and more like a photograph. Then the first low-polygon animation popped up and wow, the people in Alone in the Dark move like real people, how spooky and realistic! I remember some games on my SNES had grey "sweat" when people got hurt because having red blood was "too realistic" and traumatic for kids to handle. And on and on, amazing new heights of realism being reached every 5 years, making everything that came before it look like unplayable fakey fake poo poo. Until now we have games where you play a soldier out in a realistic environment and the character models are so detailed that you can see the drat pores in their skin. Wow! (In a couple more years we'll realize that today's super-realistic character models still look more like Realdolls than real people.) The best you've ever seen looks fantastic to you. Looking back we may not think silly old black and white movies could ever have been immersive enough to warp people's view of reality. But compared to a low budget stage play, those old movies were just like being there for real. The shower scene in Psycho was shocking and visceral, just like you are standing there in the bathroom watching it happen (it was realistic enough that my own grandmother claimed she stopped having showers for a few months after seeing it.) At the time they definitely did shape people's view of history and violence.
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Jun 29, 2012 21:10
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Professor Clumsy posted:I'm seeing this argument around a lot and it does have some validity. I would argue, however, that this can be compared to something like Horrible Histories, which highlights the brutality of actual violence throughout history in an effort to pique the interest of children. In Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, we know that vampires are not real, so it stands to reason that the film is actually about Abraham Lincoln, who was real. The teachings of history are refined through fiction. The lessons are more important than the facts. This is one more positive outlook on it, and I think that this could be true to some extent in AL:VH, although this movie does seem a bit scant on the historical details, and the movie doesn't seem quite suited to young children. Yet the history does seem to be a more simplified child-like version of history rather than a mature understanding. The main elements of the real history that were covered were just the grade school basics - Lincoln existed, he was the president that ended slavery, his two arguably most important rhetorical contributions of the emancipation proclamation and the Gettysburg address..and well, that's about it. And the description of the economic institution of slavery was obscured by interweaving it with some kind of vampiric and supernatural conspiracy. Of course, it may be rather brilliant if vampires are really just a way of stacking on the moral repugnance we should feel towards the pre-bellum the South - after all, slavery could be seen as a vampiric institution, sucking the life away from a repressed group of people to prop up the lives of others. However, this is at the cost of removing moral ambiguity from a historical thread that is all too often portrayed in black and white terms, just as Inglorious Basterds and other movies portray WWII (nazis = bad, mass slaughter of jews = bad, but mass slaugher of nazis = good). Of course, society at large is hugely guilty of the Romanticism and moral simplification of history so this isn't a problem unique to these movies at any rate. Angela Christine posted:I don't know, we may be underestimating how realistic things seemed to those audiences. When you go back and look at the first CGI it is hilariously fake. The puppets and practical effects before that? Also pretty drat fake. Early colour films? Grainy and fake. The first talkies? Terrible sound quality. The first motion pictures? Hah, mimes are more convincing. Looking backwards, films have just now with the advent of high def finally become realistic enough to warp viewers perceptions of reality. Yes, and my central premise (which is probably impossible to prove/disprove) is that these kinds of things very subtly influence how we think about the world, and you might even say that how we think about the world influences further artistic endeavors and the process is like some kind of feedback loop - a hall of mirrors reflecting in imagine back on itself over and over until it becomes an even greater distortion of the truth. Art imitates reality, which influences further art. In this case one movie sets a precedent and a depiction of reality which makes others in the "Artworld" (thinking of Arthur Danto's essay) possible. quote:On the other hand, I remember being astonished by the lifelike graphics in video games starting in the 1980s. I see the point you are making here, but I guess I would just say that remember there will be an audience of those younger than you who never saw the intermediary stages, and that now the hard cap of realism has been hit. It's reached 10/10 aka indistinguishable from reality. Also, I don't doubt for a minute that even older digital media influenced my perception of the world, and maybe this influence even increased as it got more convincing. quote:The best you've ever seen looks fantastic to you. Looking back we may not think silly old black and white movies could ever have been immersive enough to warp people's view of reality. But compared to a low budget stage play, those old movies were just like being there for real. The shower scene in Psycho was shocking and visceral, just like you are standing there in the bathroom watching it happen (it was realistic enough that my own grandmother claimed she stopped having showers for a few months after seeing it.) At the time they definitely did shape people's view of history and violence. But what happens when it becomes indistinguishable from reality?
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Jun 30, 2012 00:08
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CowOnCrack posted:But what happens when it becomes indistinguishable from reality? Teach people critical thinking skills so that they don't ever mistake a self-proclaimed fictional story as fact?
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Jun 30, 2012 02:12
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CowOnCrack posted:
We're still a long way from holodecks. As long as movies are just a flat rectangle, they are distinguishable from reality. Especially if you are watching on Netflix or something, and you immersion can easily be broken by a cat stepping in front of the screen. Bad kitty!
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Jun 30, 2012 02:35
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I think an argument of realism vs. truth vs. facts in film can only be really understood in a pop culture context. Right now we're seeing a lot of filmmakers rejecting realism to find the truth (The Grey, Killer Joe, Battleship, Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter) and it could be argued that realism was the domain of mainstream cinema in the 70s and is no longer considered even mildly important. The question of "But what happens when it becomes indistinguishable from reality?" is an ignorant one because in the history of art, artists have always put importance on truth (personal, political, what have you) over realism and facts. There are periods where realism is in vogue, but that definitely isn't now or in the foreseeable future.
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Jun 30, 2012 12:19
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Professor Clumsy posted:There are periods where realism is in vogue, but that definitely isn't now or in the foreseeable future. Maybe not in film, but one could argue that the incessant push towards more and more realistic graphics in video games (especially in progressively realistic military-themed FPS games that regularly top the market) is an opposing and very strong realism trend in media. It could be that cinema is more reacting to the new big dog's path than it is to its own history. Clumsy, would you mind expanding on what you mean by "realism" or its inverse in film? Are you talking thematically, visually, overall, how? Because one could argue that Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter is, as a work of historical fiction that borrows its dramatic moments from true events, an example of hyper realism, itself an interesting avenue in the arts. How do you personally define the terms here? Edit- One more question: Did you really like Roger Corman's "Frankenstein Unbound" too? Because that's the film that AL:VH kept reminding me of in its scifi monster historical fiction self-aware silliness. BoldFrankensteinMir fucked around with this message at 01:11 on Jul 1, 2012 |
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Jul 1, 2012 00:55
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Offkorn posted:Teach people critical thinking skills so that they don't ever mistake a self-proclaimed fictional story as fact? Yes, teaching critical thinking is very important and I don't think most people will take these stories as fact at any rate. But these movies and their images and messages influence things anyway, despite our conscious attempts to put them in their place. Trivializing violence, in particular, is something that influences at least some of its viewers regardless of critical thinking levels. Also, broader worldviews and perceptions can be affected. For example, in one well known media study individuals were polled according to an index of a 'dangerous, scary world' which evaluated their perceptions of the world, with Q/A like, "How likely is a stranger to help you? 1) Likely, 2) Not likely, 3) They are like to harm you" and so on. They controlled for factors such as education level and they tried to determine the effect of constant exposure to news on television. Every conceivable category had some individuals with a more negative, fearful, and/or paranoid outlook on the world with a high degree of exposure to television news, although those with at least a college education were much less influenced. But even if individuals aren't influenced, dialog and standards for further art are. Society as a whole is - it's inevitable. This isn't saying much of interest or importance of course. I just hope these kinds of movies are discussed critically for their merits and demerits and that most people can have a chance to consider the art from multiple perspectives. Another reason why film criticism is great and you current releases guys do a great job, by the way. It was your review that sparked me to go see the movie with my mother and she thought it was great fun. I am just the one more prone to over-analysis.
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Jul 1, 2012 05:35
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BoldFrankensteinMir posted:Maybe not in film, but one could argue that the incessant push towards more and more realistic graphics in video games (especially in progressively realistic military-themed FPS games that regularly top the market) is an opposing and very strong realism trend in media. It could be that cinema is more reacting to the new big dog's path than it is to its own history. I'm talking specifically in visual storytelling terms. Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter definitely uses historical realism to set its scene in a believable way, but then takes us on flights of fancy. Be careful not to confuse believability with realism. Your point about video games is dead on, mainstream game developers are definitely aspiring for realism on the whole but I do not think that cinema is following that trend at all. Most gamers will talk about "immersion" when discussing a game, they want no boundaries between them and the llusion that they are the character on screen, cinema reduces the audience to an observer ad is much more free for doing so. Compare the military realism in any Call of Duty game to that presented in Battleship and you'll see what I mean. The tactics in a movie doen't need to make sense because the actions of characters on screen are all manipulated in pursuit of "the point", whereas the characters in a video game are manipulated in the pursuit of victory. quote:Edit- One more question: Did you really like Roger Corman's "Frankenstein Unbound" too? Because that's the film that AL:VH kept reminding me of in its scifi monster historical fiction self-aware silliness. I'm ashamed to say I haven't seen it. CowOnCrack posted:But even if individuals aren't influenced, dialog and standards for further art are. Society as a whole is - it's inevitable. This isn't saying much of interest or importance of course. I just hope these kinds of movies are discussed critically for their merits and demerits and that most people can have a chance to consider the art from multiple perspectives. This is definitely a healthy attitude to have. You found the implications of Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter questionable and started a discussion about it. I remember when The Avengers came out and people were actually saying "Yes, there are questionable political ideas in here but I don't care." Of course they should care and they shouldn't assume that those political ideas are there by accident whether they agree with them or not.
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Jul 1, 2012 10:55
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I finally caught up with this thread after months of neglect and I'd like to thank everyone for their positive encouragement. It balances out the years of therapy I need after One for the Money and truly makes the stinkers worthwhile. VVVVV THANKS! VVVVV Keanu Grieves fucked around with this message at 13:00 on Jul 2, 2012 |
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Jul 2, 2012 07:52
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Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter owns bones and thank you Clumsy for recommending it. Thanks to all the Current Releases people. You guys have pointed out some really good movies, and write drat good reviews. I've really gotten into film over the last year largely because of your reviews and Cinema Discusso in general.
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Jul 2, 2012 10:28
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Your review of Seeking a Friend for the End of the World got me to watch Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. The bookstore scene with things disappearing, pages blanking out, etc, was creepy and incredibly subtle. Thanks for the suggestion!
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Jul 3, 2012 22:37
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I went out and made Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter my 4th of July movie because of the review. It's so ridiculous it owns. Only way I can put it.
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Jul 4, 2012 22:18
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Have to agree with the review for Killer Joe. That ending was something all-right. I saw it in a packed cinema and it went from intense quiet to howls of laughter at the end, and then straight back to intense quiet after what people realise they were laughing at. Hell, I felt guilty for laughing. Really loving good movie that people should make a priority to see if they can, though.
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Jul 4, 2012 22:32
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Bedevere posted:Your review of Seeking a Friend for the End of the World got me to watch Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. The bookstore scene with things disappearing, pages blanking out, etc, was creepy and incredibly subtle. Thanks for the suggestion!
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Jul 5, 2012 19:52
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quote:When I set about building the Laird Compound, they said it couldn't be done. They said, "Don't you know how zombies work? They'll see the lights from the spires for miles around and won't stop until they've beaten down your door and devoured every one of your brains!" To which I replied, "No duh. I've taken extensive notes on season two of The Walking Dead. As long as we build a perimeter, maybe dig a moat and don't let the female characters do anything important, most everyone will survive until at least season three." And then I built my fortified compound, to the accolades of survivor camps from here to New Kalamazoo. Everything turned out better than expected, and everyone gave me a standing ovation. Also, zombie attacks are down by 17%, so suck on that you zombified morons.
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Jul 8, 2012 15:09
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FAT BATMAN posted:This paragraph made me laugh pretty hard, especially the bolded line. Does that count as a CineD inside joke? Yeah, kind of. It's a nod to this classic forum exchange. You'll see references to it in CineD from time to time.
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Jul 8, 2012 15:27
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I really enjoyed the reviews this week. Great work, guys!
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Jul 8, 2012 17:25
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I think I need to clear the air here and make it known that Something Awful movie critic Jeremy oval office sacrificed a great deal of his journalistic integrity by stating that my "unstoppable dump" was somehow correlated to my preemptive opinion of Oliver Stone's Savages, when the reality is that it was, in fact, an entirely unrelated dump.
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Jul 8, 2012 21:22
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Having just seen Spider-Man, I've got to say that this iteration actually has the least chance of someone other than Peter Parker being bitten by the scientifically-miraculous spider. There's two layers of bio-containment that he has to get through and one of those magic bio suits that movies love which he neglects to put on. Then he dodges the arachnid advances of hundreds of the things after doing something stupid that no one who works there is likely to do. Finally the spider that "bit" him seemed to instead inject him with an anchor for it's web. Really it looks more like the spider found the point where his neck and shoulders met to be so sexy as to be irresistible to a little spider lovin'. Which honestly seems somewhat more likely to infect you with spider powers than being injected with it's venom. So science hand waving aside, and forgetting the following plot with Dr. Connors that more or less directly contradicts the given premise of just the good spider powers from a completely unregulated non-dose, I've got to say this is probably the best thought out Spider bite gives science dork powers scenario yet presented to the viewing public.
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Jul 8, 2012 22:42
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"Donovan Laird's Katy Perry: A Part of Me review posted:These songs, while equally strong, display a tone somewhat raunchier than I was expecting for a film geared toward tweens and their moms. I have not seen this movie, but I have babysitten my younger cousins. From my experiences, I believe this line betrays an ignorance of tweens, mother's of tweens, and the music they listen to.
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Jul 9, 2012 00:36
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Is Jeremy oval office/Keanu Grieves the only one on the staff who isn't pigeonholed into reviewing a type of movie when it comes out? Prof. Clumsy has superhero movies, Vargo has the movies with a religious message behind them (although they're few and far between), and of course Jay Dub has the talking animal movies.
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Jul 9, 2012 08:21
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Y-Hat posted:Is Jeremy oval office/Keanu Grieves the only one on the staff who isn't pigeonholed into reviewing a type of movie when it comes out? Prof. Clumsy has superhero movies, Vargo has the movies with a religious message behind them (although they're few and far between), and of course Jay Dub has the talking animal movies. Vargo isn't the only one who gets Religious movies. Jay Dub brought us the classic review known as Suing the Devil.
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Jul 9, 2012 08:24
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I wanna say his niche is 'weird poo poo', but the only thing I have to back that up is his review of My Soul To Take, which is still one of my favorite things we've ever run.Schwarzwald posted:I have not seen this movie, but I have babysitten my younger cousins. From my experiences, I believe this line betrays an ignorance of tweens, mother's of tweens, and the music they listen to. That, like much of the review, was a line I wrote knowing full well it wasn't true. Tweens very well could be savvy enough to pick up some of that stuff, and mom and dad almost certainly. But it's all in good fun, so who really cares? Laird is kind of working under the assumption that the 2010s were the idyllic 'good old days' the way we think of our grandparents' generation, and a song about staring at a dude's dick doesn't really fit into that mold.
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Jul 9, 2012 13:40
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Finally got to see AL:VH and I agree it is incredible. I am amazed at how they really wove the fiction into historical facts. The CGI on the train and horses was a bit much and gravity defying but I guess that's what movies do now. The pace left me breathless, they got a lot of story in and only slowed down for a speech or two. The story moves fast and is pretty relentless. For once I actually liked the ending. The only real downer was the audience. Once incredibly overweight guy in front of me was sitting in the handicap row (wide aisle wheelchairs can fit in) and he fell asleep within 5 minutes and snored the entire time. The family behind me never stopped talking about the snoring guy and discussing Civil War era history that they were clearly fuzzy on. At least they understood the basic context. Edit: I meant to mention I felt like some political flag waving was very intentional - the vampires wanting a nation of their own (are we mirroring isreal/palastine?) and the position taken by Henry on slavery (and the rather pointed question coming out of that conversation). I liked it but at the same time felt it was almost too obvious. Bedevere fucked around with this message at 19:02 on Jul 9, 2012 |
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Jul 9, 2012 18:58
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Prof Clumsy, have you seen the Half in the Bag review of Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter? Normally I think it's pointless to pit one review against another, but they seem to make exactly the opposite claims as you on a number of points. Would you care to respond? http://redlettermedia.com/half-in-the-bag-abraham-lincoln-vampire-hunter-and-thats-my-boy/
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Jul 9, 2012 19:41
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Y-Hat posted:Is Jeremy oval office/Keanu Grieves the only one on the staff who isn't pigeonholed into reviewing a type of movie when it comes out? Prof. Clumsy has superhero movies, Vargo has the movies with a religious message behind them (although they're few and far between), and of course Jay Dub has the talking animal movies. What's funny is that of these, I think Jay Dub's is the only one which is intentional. I also wind up getting a lot of romantic comedies. For a long time, I thought I was going to be "the rom-com guy."
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Jul 9, 2012 20:35
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Gyges posted:Having just seen Spider-Man, I've got to say that this iteration actually has the least chance of someone other than Peter Parker being bitten by the scientifically-miraculous spider. There's two layers of bio-containment that he has to get through and one of those magic bio suits that movies love which he neglects to put on. Then he dodges the arachnid advances of hundreds of the things after doing something stupid that no one who works there is likely to do. Finally the spider that "bit" him seemed to instead inject him with an anchor for it's web. Really it looks more like the spider found the point where his neck and shoulders met to be so sexy as to be irresistible to a little spider lovin'. Which honestly seems somewhat more likely to infect you with spider powers than being injected with it's venom. Okay, I like the idea that the magical spider actually attempts to gently caress Peter, rather than it being a bite. Opens up some interesting avenues. Y-Hat posted:Is Jeremy oval office/Keanu Grieves the only one on the staff who isn't pigeonholed into reviewing a type of movie when it comes out? Prof. Clumsy has superhero movies, Vargo has the movies with a religious message behind them (although they're few and far between), and of course Jay Dub has the talking animal movies. None of the pigeonholes are deliberate. The superhero thing comes from my being in the UK and having my assignments dictated by release dates. These big superhero movies always seem to get international releases right off the bat. Jay Dub's talking animal thing came about quite naturally, he did a great review for Marmaduke and there are so many talking animal movies coming out and readers seemed to enjoy watching them drive Joe crazy so it became his thing. We never sat down and said "oh, you can be this guy and you can be that guy". Any apparent niches beyond Joe's are pure chance. BoldFrankensteinMir posted:Prof Clumsy, have you seen the Half in the Bag review of Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter? Normally I think it's pointless to pit one review against another, but they seem to make exactly the opposite claims as you on a number of points. Would you care to respond? There's not a lot to argue against here, they don't even agree with each other entirely. I will say that the comment of "I wouldn't recommend it because it's for a very select audience" is an odd one. As a critic, you should be making it clearer who that select audience might be. I don't know, I just felt that the analysis was a bit weak.
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Jul 10, 2012 12:12
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Professor Clumsy posted:None of the pigeonholes are deliberate. The superhero thing comes from my being in the UK and having my assignments dictated by release dates. These big superhero movies always seem to get international releases right off the bat. Jay Dub's talking animal thing came about quite naturally, he did a great review for Marmaduke and there are so many talking animal movies coming out and readers seemed to enjoy watching them drive Joe crazy so it became his thing. We never sat down and said "oh, you can be this guy and you can be that guy". Any apparent niches beyond Joe's are pure chance. Sometimes I question my ability to form coherent sentences. So thanks for that.
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Jul 10, 2012 14:21
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Few things I gotta say: 1.) I watched Warrior, and thought it was really drat good. 2.) I subsequently read Vargo's review, and thought that was really good too. 3.) I have to disagree on one minor point with the review, in which it's stated that the Russian guy is pretty much in two-dimensional Ivan Drago territory. A fascinating detail they provide for him, which is much in line with the intellectual cultural references, is that his entrance music is a song by Vladimir Vysotsky, a hugely important folk singer in Soviet history; it's a simplistic comparison but he was basically the Bob Dylan of Russia. The song is called "Capricious Horses". I don't know what more to say about it other than that it was a really interesting creative choice for that scene. Also since it's a song about horses in a film, my brain can probably link it to Tarkovsky somehow, and that pleases me.
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Jul 10, 2012 17:05
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Kull the Conqueror posted:Few things I gotta say: My roommate pointed this out to me the second time, and it just adds to the idea I put forward in the first sentence, that Warrior is so good because it is so drat smart. Also, Koba is played by Kurt "The American Dream" Angle which makes it even more brilliant. I kinda love the fact that Koba never speaks now, and I now wish for More Koba.
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Jul 11, 2012 05:25
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What the hell? That was Kurt Angle? Holy cow!
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Jul 12, 2012 04:09
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Warrior owns. I told y'all.
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Jul 12, 2012 04:59
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Jay Dub, congratulations. Your review of Ice Age: Continental Drift is the best review CR has done this year. http://www.somethingawful.com/d/current-movie-reviews/ice-age-continental.php I know that might sound weird, but consider this- Pauline Kael once responded, to the question of what's the hardest review she ever had to write, that there was no way she could remember it because that's what makes reviews hard- when the film isn't memorable. Great reviews are easy to write because you can gush about how much you love it, terrible reviews are easy to write because you can rip into it with a frenzy, but reviews for a movie that's just kinda... there? Those are the challenging ones to make fun and interesting. And you manage to do it with aplomb. You clearly understand this series, you clearly understand where we are right now with animation (your comments about A-list celebrities taking voice-acting gigs they're not really qualified for is spot on, and mirrors something very similar Billy West said this year ComicCon which I also found fascinating), and your observation about the family in front of you is simultaneously heartwarming and insightful. You don't rake the film over coals incessantly, you point out the flaws and also the strengths, and in the end you have an enjoyable review that informs me very concisely whether or not I would want to see it, without you ever directly saying "see it" or "don't see it". For a title that's apparently pretty mundane without a whole lot going for it (or against it), that's a hell of an accomplishment. Kudos.
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Jul 15, 2012 13:06
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I wrote this piece on Batman & Robin for wagthemovie.net. You should go and read it and then read everything else on that site, especially Kevin Courtemanche's reviews. He's pretty good, you know?
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Jul 15, 2012 23:32
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Is there some joke here? My anti-virus has a poo poo over that site and it's listed in a bunch of block lists. CORRECTION: Only Trend Micro has an issue with the domain. Bedevere fucked around with this message at 19:48 on Jul 16, 2012 |
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Jul 16, 2012 13:21
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Bedevere posted:Is there some joke here? My anti-virus has a poo poo over that site and it's listed in a bunch of block lists. Wait... What? edit: I'm genuinely baffled by this. It's the first I've heard of anything like it. Professor Clumsy fucked around with this message at 14:59 on Jul 16, 2012 |
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Jul 16, 2012 14:09
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