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Shadow Hog posted:I dunno, while Zootopia'd only be merely good without the message (as opposed to excellent), the world-building is still pretty spectacular compared to pretty much any other talking animal film out there. Like, I haven't seen the full film (and am not exactly falling over myself to do so), but the trailer for Sing just had me constantly thinking "man, Disney realized this world concept so much better earlier this year". You'd think so from the trailers, but I saw Sing last weekend (the only other films I was interested in were really deep dark dramas which I wasn't really in the mood for), and... well, would you believe it's all right? I mean, I don't want to oversell it or anything, Zootopia is unquestionably better in terms of worldbuilding, narrative, and social commentary, but while the creation process for Sing does feel completely cynical in that it shamelessly combines two things- cute talking animals and reality shows- that are proven to make obscene amounts of cash, the end result surprisingly doesn't fall into the easy trap I thought it was going to, ie. use the concept to make mean-spirited humor of untalented people being yelled at and shamed by judges and the audience. Instead, it is completely sincere about not only the star-for-a-day mystique about shows like American Idol or The Voice, as well as the "let's all get together and sing a song" exuberance of James Corden and his Carpool Karaoke, but the potential for art and beauty to inspire others and that anyone who loves music can enjoy and participate as well. If anyone is mocked, it's the ones that think music is only for the talented and learned and that anyone not willing to devote their lives to music and be paid for their efforts should get out of the way of those who do, a viewpoint embodied by Mike, and even by Buster Moon himself, and it's something they're both punished for by the end. And I dig that, it scratched the feel-good itch I needed.
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Dec 28, 2016 15:40
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Hedrigall posted:Catdick? Like a feline private investigator? Blacksad is French, you're right, but I'm not sure what that has to do with Beauty and the Beast. Though Blacksad was Spanish, actually... But yeah... I deny know how to feel about this new BatB. It's an opportunity to update the bits of the original story that I didn't really like, but it just looks so... empty in the trailer.
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Feb 4, 2017 23:24
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Macaluso posted:That's not too surprising. Every place keeps going on about omg it's Disney's first openly gay character go Disney!!! Except that the character is the lackey of one of the grosser Disney villians and if he's anything like the animated version he's mostly a joke character. I'm not gay so I can't really comment on how the gay community feels about it, I've just seen this response on twitter a lot from gay people I follow. I think it's more people are more annoyed at everyone patting Disney on the pack for this than the actual character itself Yeah. If feels particularly egregious, because for all their talk of having a "gay moment" (whatever that mean), from all the material released so far, it doesn't look like it's actually doing anything different from the gay coding of villains done in the past (and in usually a much more classy manner) a la Scar, Jafar, and Ratigan. And since at least two of those guys were much more intelligent and charming than Le Fou (which means "crazy," I remind) anyway... this doesn't feel like a step up, exactly. A pink bow? Seriously? So I probably won't see the movie because of Josh Gad. If I see the movie, it will be to see what Emma Watson can do with a character that was pretty much a cipher* in the animated movie... and because I want to see if the Beast and his relationships with people have changed. I was given some hope by the rose in the trailers, because that's from the original fairy tale, but it does look like they're cleaving close to what happens in the 1990 movie, which kinda makes me sad since there was not enough difference drawn between the Beast and Gaston for my taste. Oh, there was a difference, of course: both are portrayed initially as ravening beasts who only see Belle as a means to an end and want to trap her in a reductionist role to serve that end, but only one is willing to whip up a mob and kill people to do it.** * Seriously, who is Belle? What does she want to do; what is her arc? The only traits that the movie ascribed to her was "likes books" and "wants adventure", without actually describing what adventure means in this instance. Is it travelling the world? Starting her own business somewhere? In fact, the only thing she does that indicates a particular intelligence is dressing the Beast's wounds, and that falls under the same feminine auspice that was "allowed" at the time; we aren't shown that she is actually smart, we are told so. Jasmine from Aladdin suffers from much the same problem, having only the trait of "not wanting to marry someone she didn't choose" as any sort of character, which is a step back if anything- such a character isn't a character, it's a polemic against arranged marriage. ** Well, okay, there are some discernible positive character changes that can be noticed in the Beast's character journey. But the change is too abrupt to be believable to me: first he's horrible to Belle, then they save each other's lives, after which everything is great? That's not enough of a contrast with Gaston to really bring home the point that the movie was very obviously going for (outward appearances don't matter); remember, in the original fairy tale, the Beast was nothing but absolutely polite and kind to Belle, he just forbade her to leave and didn't show himself- Belle had to find out that he was a Beast at all, which is a heck of a lot more agency than Belle ever got in the movie. I'm not saying that the Beast had to be absolutely nice, but there should have been something besides being a furry Gaston to get Belle to want to stay. Besides, it's always bothered me that the Beast never apologizes on-screen to Belle for his actions, for hurting Maurice or Belle's own imprisonment- the apology is meant to be implied by the wolf attack, and then the whole giving the library to her later, and Bell accepts it as such. Don't like that: an apology is an apology, is saying "I'm sorry," or it's not an apology, it's a distraction from the issue... and going through personal suffering or loss doesn't cut it, and shouldn't, and it is a disservice to say otherwise, particularly in a movie for children ("Hey Kids! if you mess up really bad, you don't have to say you're sorry: just get really hurt saving a life and shower people with presents, and you're golden!") e: drat, thought I fixed that... resurgam40 fucked around with this message at 20:47 on Mar 3, 2017 |
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Mar 3, 2017 20:06
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I was kinda thinking. "Beaver? Was there an animated movie with a beaver that I missed somewhere?" I haven't sen an animated beaver since... well heck, when did I? The only one I can think of is Mr. Beaver and his wife from Lion, Witch and Wardrobe, but that wan't animated...
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Nov 2, 2017 05:05
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Hm, I don't recall if it was brought up recently in the thread, but did anyone see Loving Vincent? I saw it last weekend, and I was wondering what the general consensus was, because as a visual spectacle, it is really cool, and not as disorienting as you would think, at least not for me. For those who aren't aware, it's a painted movie: it was created over seven years by a team of over 100 painters, to create a final product of 853 shots, entirely of oil and charcoal- about the only things that aren't are the photographs of the actors over the credits. I saw it at the AFI cinema, and I definitely see why they would take an interest; it's a stunning achievement and a cinematic first. The script is, um... well, it's well acted, but if you've seen the trailers, you might come into the movie thinking there's some big mystery to be solved, or some new insight into Van Gogh as an artist or man, and... there isn't. They present the details of his death (the film takes place one year after) and the impressions some people might have gotten from them, and they don't really say anything that you haven't heard before: that he was troubled, that he was difficult with, that he loved his brother very much, and that he died. And as you can imagine, a lot of reviewers are let down by this: some find it boring or hollow, some find it essentially a "spot the painting" of Van Gogh's work (all the characters in the story are based on subjects of Van Gogh's paisome don't see the point of it being a feature length production, et cetera. I personally don't have these complaints but I do understand them: film is an audio-visual medium, after all, and while I might lean toward the latter aspect rather than the former in judging movies (unless the former is a real stinker I can't ignore), you cant discount both of these aspects totally and be honest about reviewing a movie. But I thought the script was fine- nothing great, but serviceable for the purposes of the movie- and I thought the score was fine- Clint Mansell, though admittedly not his best work. And I'm mentioning it here, because it is animation- and lo and behold, not intended for kids or families. So yeah- I recommend, if you can see it. If you're near a theater showing it, or if it comes to your art museum later, it's worth a look.
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Nov 14, 2017 17:34
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So apparently, Ferdinand isn't bad, according to initial reviews... I think I was turned off a bit by the previews, but some people seem to have liked it. What say you guys, assuming anyone rushed out on opening weekend to see it?
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Dec 19, 2017 14:03
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Barudak posted:I also vaguely recall that the director has intense survivors guilt which is why he has his self-insert protagonist die at the end. It's not really the director's story; Takahata adapted the story from the novel by Akiyuki Nosaka, who died only a few years ago. It is supposed to be a really good adaptation though; the survivor's guilt aspect absolutely comes through, it just isn't Takahata's. Terrific movie, really, one of his greatest. I view it less as a specific condemnation of the war or of Seita or society (although Takahata/Nosaka are clearly not fans of the feelings of nationalsim that prevailed during the war years), but a tragedy of circumstance created by the failure of every party concerned. It is rather a departure from Miyazaki's normal work- Lord knows, he doesn't have the rosiest outlook on humanity either, but he prefers stories in which tremendous feeling, virtue and effort are rewarded in the end. Takahata, well... he seems to get that you can feel and do as much as you like, but sometimes it still doesn't work out due to factors entirely beyond your control. Not as spiritually fulfilling but but certainly more realistic.
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Feb 5, 2018 21:49
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SirDrone posted:So all in all we can tie Good Dinsoaur and A Bugs Life in the category of Mediocre pixar movies, because I hate Cars 2 with a passion. You know, I've been thinking a lot about A Bugs Life, as I've been thinking a lot about Early Pixar and my relationship to it, and whether... I really like them very much at the end of the day. I've never seen The Good Dinosaur, but I've seen Bug's Life multiple times, and I have to ask- is there anything really to that movie beyond being a comedic riff on The Magnificent Seven/Seven Samurai? Where was the emotional center, what was the point? Obviously part of it was for Flick to learn a lesson about being truthful and owning up to his mistakes, but there was no real point in time when he did that; oh he suffered for his mistakes plenty, as most of the characters suffered (and mostly for comedic purposes; there is a real undercurrent of bleakness and spite in the movie's humor and use of violence), but there was no real "come to jesus" moment in which he was given a speech or an action to show how much he'd learned and what. Besides... there's the point that he wasn't really... well, wrong, at least at the beginning. All of his inventions worked and would have made things better if they'd been accepted, but he was ostracized for being a kook and an upstart, and the instigation of "the problem" was a genuine accident and not any kind of ambition on his part. It's only after he was exiled/set out on his journey that he "did wrong" in lying first to the troupe, and then to the colony when he got back, but like I said, that never really comes up again in either a lesson or changed behavior: Flick's lie is revealed, he is punished, he gets the sads, and is brought back around by the "pretend it's a seed" callback to teach him to believe in his inventions, which has nothing to do with honesty at all, so  It's morally confusing is what I mean, and is also tonally confusing, with the sense of humor I mentioned earlier and the inclusion of Hopper. I mean, for a story of this nature, you'd expect a bully or something, not the total despotic monster he was in the film, both doling out and receiving harsh, nightmarish fates. It's bleak and stark is what I mean, as I suppose are the westerns they wanted to invoke with such work, but not in anyway that serves the narrative, and as for anything more they wanted to do with it, there's just... nothing.That's the thing that strikes me about Pixar's body of work as a whole: it's well known that their creative process boils down to "What if thing... but with thing", but rewatching some of their movies, it's not completely clear that there is anything else involved beyond that, and sometimes it doesn't even get that far, only saying "Isn't thing cool?" for an hour and twenty minutes to two hours. I personally find that my most favorite movies, the ones I cared to revisit, are ones with a genuine emotional center behind them: UP, even though the sentiment is front-loaded; Monsters, Inc, even though the sentiment is severely back- loaded; and Finding Nemo and Wall-E, in which the emotions are placed front and center and thus make the movies all the stronger*. Cars never really had an emotional center I could get behind (or maybe I just never cared for Doc Hollywood all that much), and while Toy Story did... it was never one that I could latch onto, due to its weird specificity in its nostalgia, and thus they all pretty much leave me cold because it's all centered around toys, which I never had a lot of growing up and thus never had to leave behind or dispose of. The moments of genuine existential angst and fear due to the Ending of Things... well, they almost work for me, but they're always peripheral, ancillary to the action going on, and never are explored to my liking or go anywhere I genuinely don't expect. So I am unmoved... I did not cry, (Now, Wreck it Ralph and Coco? Those I cried at, and while I didn't cry at Moana, I liked it a great deal more than the entirety of the Toy Story franchise... make of that what you will.) *I suppose I should include the Incredibles here, as it is still the best Fantastic Four movie still ever made, but it suffers from similar thematic and tonal confusion, mostly due to its weird, part humanist part misanthropic politics, which somehow includes both the superhero ideal of helping people with some weird, proto-Randian idea of the Singular Man, i dunno, it's just weird.
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Feb 14, 2018 18:39
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Samuel Clemens posted:I think you're too focused on Flik as an individual. It's true that we inhabit his point of view for most of the runtime, but A Bug's Life isn't the story of his failure and eventual redemption, it's a story of the downtrodden realising their own potential and rising up against their oppressors. The ants can only triumph because everyone learns a lesson: Flik that he can't do it alone, the queen that she needs to have more faith in her subjects, and the circus performers that there are causes worth dying for. ... Hm! This is actually a really good reading that solves a lot of the problems I have with it. Of course, now I wish that it had banged that drum a little stronger in order to add the cohesion it needed; as it is, it feels like a collection of characters (most of whom are admittedly strong) reenacting a famous movie. But I suppose that would have smacked too much of the dreaded Bolshevism that wasn't really in vogue then. Now explain Cars in a way I can get behind  (All right, I admit that a lot of my dislike towards that series stems from the existence of curio shops in that world, which, how does that even work? Do they put the tchotchkes in their trunk? But how do they take them out? They don't have hands! ... I might be too literal minded.)
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Feb 14, 2018 22:04
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Well, I liked Loving Vincent!  (...as a technical showcase, that is; the story itself is boring as hell and the "mystery" they try to set up just isn't that compelling. But drat, if it wasn't a treat to bask in the watercolor and identify all of Van Gogh paintings that influenced the work. But no, this wouldn't have won.) All, in all, I'm happy that Coco won, though, if only because I'm a sucker for the kind of emotions they hammered on and representation is important.
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Mar 5, 2018 21:22
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Larryb posted:Out of curiosity, was the book series it's loosely based on any better? The Chronicles of Prydain? It's amazing; truly one of the greats in early reading classics, but not really a good choice for a Disney movie or even series of movies, given how dark it is. I don't mean dark like Game of Thrones, with blood, betrayal, sex, and gore- I mean, there's violence, but it's never treated as visceral or exciting in the least and most of the time you just see the aftermath. I mean dark like The Last Unicorn- it has individual exciting, humorous elements to it, but overall it's a sad story, melancholic, with the air of a bittersweet ballad celebrating long-ago triumph and glory. Sort of like Diet Lord Of The Rings for those who couldn't get past that loving forest and can't stand Tom Bombadil... you can make a good story out of that, but it unequivocally would not suit the Disney Brand, as it were. To illustrate what I mean... The Black Cauldron The Movie is based loosely off of the first two books in the series, and taken on its own terms, it's... meh? I mean, it's all right, but it was obviously made as an attempt to appeal to "boys"- to the adventuresome, superhero crowd, something that would be done to greater effect with Gargoyles and even Atlantis (Hell, Treasure Planet is better, because it is actually a passable adaptation of Treasure Island, something this movie is not), because they remembered to put in a thought out story. It's meant to make the audience feel empowered, to beat the bad guys, to win, right? Well...
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Aug 24, 2018 14:29
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(Sorry for the break, had to change computers at work) Do you remember the protagonist of the story, Taran? The brash, imaginative kid who has "This is the hero" written all over him and rises to the occasion in the movie? He spends the first two books getting the poo poo kicked out of him, pretty much, in a way that's not empowering or fun to watch. He desperately aches to prove himself, thinks he gets his chance when the pig he's looking after runs away, and pretty much spends the entire time eating poo poo while other people do the more important, supposedly glorious things. The arc of his story is all about how he should stop trying to be special and just be himself- the plot of A Goofy Movie*, so Disney is no stranger to that kind of story- but in order to get there, his life lessons are not so much gentle prodding as it is a repeated sledgehammer to the face. Taran spends the entirety of Book One and a good 60% of Book 2 breaking stuff, getting his rear end handed to him in combat, disappointing his friends and allies, and generally being wrong about pretty much everything - all the while having his nose rubbed in about how completely unimportant he is in the grand scheme of things (the aforementioned pig he looks after is more magical and important than he is, to give you an idea; it can tell the future)- before just barely pulling out a win... and in the second book, it isn't even his win. You recall the part in the movie where Gurgi, imagined as the Cheerful, Annoying Animal friend, sacrificed himself to break the Black Cauldron, and then was immediately brought back 5 seconds later? Well, that part is half true, someone does jump in the Cauldron to break it- it has to be a willing sacrifice who knows he's giving up his life- but in the book, it was Taran's rival character who is also a tryhard wannabe who flails about and got the Cauldron captured again due to his own arrogance and hunger for recognition and wanted to make amends. And then he dies, leaving Taran to wonder if they could have been friends, and he doesn't come back. "Sacrifice" is kind of the point of the entire series, really- the entire point is that there are no easy victories which you come out of intact, a point that the makers of that movie very deliberately avoided, presumably because downer endings aren't as marketable. Other changes include The Horned King as this cackling bad guy rather than the silent force of nature he's portrayed as in the novel, and of course, an incompetent lackey as a henchman (don't want the villains to come off as too scary, don't you know). I didn't really care for it. *Although that still doesn't really work, as AGM is as much about Goofy learning to listen better as a parent as it is about Max learning to stop fronting, and for both of them to communicate more. It's a relationship story, not an adventure one, even if it does take the form of a road trip.
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Aug 24, 2018 15:13
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Aces High posted:That's a very interesting read of the conclusion of the book, seeing as Taran is left at the end with only Eilonwy and Gurgi with him and she can only stay because she gave up her magic. Everyone else he has met over the series has either died in the final campaign against Arawn, or is departing because they are magic in some form. Kind of a poo poo deal since he is left with a broken country to unite and teach everyone how to live without magic. There we go. Look, I get the criticism/observation that the theme of maturity and growing up is woven significantly into the narrative (it is a bildungsroman, after all), but I really don't think the end undermines anything. Taran doesn't become king because some prophecy he never knew about declared that he was Special All Along, he becomes king because he recognizes kingship not as a prize for glory where you get to do what you want, but as an arduous, thankless duty that someone does because it needs to be done, and he feels bad about loving off to Utopia while leaving behind a post war country in need of rebuilding. (Also, Gurgi goes to the Summer along with everyone else, although he does want to saty, but Taran makes him go  Alright, enough about old fantasy books)OK, maybe not entirely, because back to the movie: after all the stuff I've talked about it, I have to say that the animation is good. Better than good, really; I know not everyone can get behind the xerography thing, but it kinda works for me, especially in this setting. The painted backgrounds truly are an astounding achievement; really, they haven't looked this good since Sleeping Beauty, and their even more remarkable for being so dark and grim and yet still being clear about what's going on. Yeah, it's still a failure, but it's an ambitious failure that I don't regret watching... but exquisite? Probably not. I guess I have a special place in my heart for Akira, since that was the first movie I ever saw that made me go, "Cartoons can be like that?"...but in terms of technicality, Spirited Away and Howl's Moving Castle from Ghibli are smoother and mor technically accomplished, but that's hardly fair, given the difference of technology. And do we mean exquisite i terms of animation looking nice, or in terms of animation impressing us? Need to think about this more.
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Aug 24, 2018 23:39
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The Tintin movie was legit, yeah. I was a little put off by the facial animations at first, and the plot, as has been stated, is a little slapdash, but it was never boring and I mostly was having too much fun trying to catch all of the references they threw in (I read every book I could get my hands on; I don't know how good the translations were, but they flowed smooth enough to me). I know I missed some. So Smallfoot is opening this weekend, and I might see it; it didn't seem to do too well with critics on initial release, but they've warmed to it. The animation seems... nice; got this really soft, earnest feeling to it that I find inviting (even though it has "dance party ending" written all the hell over it). For some reason the designs remind me a little bit of the Hotel Transylvania movies, something about the eyes and the essential rubbery quality of the animation, yet I want nothing to do with HT3* and Smallfoot seems intriguing. Perhaps acting is a part of it, as I can tell Channing Tatum is assuming a character (one his is quite good at, but even so) whereas Sandler is just Sandler putting on some outrageous accent again. *Although apparently that one wasn't bad? Can somebody confirm?
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Sep 27, 2018 13:58
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I just got back from Smallfoot, in a matinee showing with me and like two other people with a kid (because it was a nice day outside and everyone apparently wants to take walks or play outside during those). And yeah, it was cute! I knew I would like the animation and character designs going in, due to the previews, but the set design and lighting are genuinely very nice, baking really good use of lighting and color to establish tone and mood. It's also a musical, which still surprises me when any movie not Disney does it, and the songs are all... OK? I guess? (One was a remix of Ice Ice Baby/Under pressure, which I found "Eh", and the one I liked the most is a rap song, presumably written by Common...) They didn't impress me, but they weren't bad, and stayed on message. Which was a good message, to be sure: don't fear the unknown, be open to communication- probably all of the things you surmised from the trailer. That's no surprise, but what is a surprise is just how dark they were willing to go- the invocation of dark humor to underline the potential dangers of the status quo, in the descriptions of Migo's family and what being the Gongringer entails over time, the harshness of the scene in which the Stonekeeper reveals the truth about the village and why they live there (probably my favorite scene in the whole movie, the cinematography is very good), and a fairly intense and final action beat that is played straight and sincere (beyond a pretty funny Pac Man gag). Sincerity is pretty much the watchword of this movie; it's earnest in a way that I haven't really seen in a lot of kid's movies, eschewing sarcasm and times for gags and scat humor* for plot and character development... which will probably cost in the box office, as gag a minute dance raves a la Trolls is "what the kiddies want", according to the reviewers who asserted that their own kids were bored when they took them. Wonder if that's why it got the dreaded PG rating... no, that was probably the aforementioned thematic elements. (But given that both Trolls and Wreck it Ralph, as well as every other animated movie I've seen, has a PG rating, the MPAA may have just gone ahead and retired the G rating.) Also, would you look at that: no dance party ending, just a cheesy group shot photograph one. All in all, liked it, would recommend, hope it does very well so more movies like it will be made. *Although the way they use that humor is my preferred method of doing so: second or two gags that are integrated subtly and not highlighted at all by anyone. And, Yeah! Thumbs Up! That's how you do it.
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Sep 29, 2018 22:18
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Space Cadet Omoly posted:And I keep telling EVERYONE that all movies (including both romantic comedies and pornographic ones) are a reflection of society as a whole and that rather than simply teaching lessons they reinforce ideals that are already prevalent in our culture and that we must figure out WHY these ideals exist before we can improve things in any meaningful way! Which in turn leads to people telling ME "Ma'am, this is a Cracker Barrel, please stop yelling at the customers"! You joke, I know, but as a librarian (even though I'll probably never be a curator of children's materials) I do think it is important that we think about what the kids are watching, why they like it, and what they take away from the movie, as well as what the movie is trying to teach. And such a thought process can be painful sometimes, because it can lead to the realization that the stuff you loved as a child yourself had deeply harmful, regressive messaging you didn't even notice until you thought about it. I, for example, love Boy Meets World growing up; it was part of TGIF and to me it was funny... but if I had a child, I wouldn't show it to them at the same age, because I don't want them getting the idea that they're a failure who will never find love if the don't find their "soul mate" in high school. There are also issues with political strawmanning, ageism, and the annoyingly centrist politics that television sitcoms were mired in at the time, but it isn't an animated feature so let's cut that off here... But yes, that largely is why I've stayed away from HT and other animated features, because they provide a recidivist, unrealistic, and even morally repugnant idea of relationships or family values (I will kill you, Despicable Me 2...) and I do not wish to support that. (This, by the by, is another point in Smallfoot's favor: no romance. There's a crush, but it's never portrayed as that important and is pretty well forgotten when things pick up.)
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Oct 1, 2018 14:10
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ThermoPhysical posted:Unfortunately, this probably won't do too well with Venom dropping this weekend. That's actually an interesting question: Smallfoot is actually a joint project between Sony Pictures Imageworks and Warner Animation Group, in which Sony animators did the movie and the animation and the film gets released under Warner. As far as I can tell, it seems to be a genuine attempt by Warner to get away from endless LEGO pictures and back to the glory days comic cartooning that they enjoyed when Loony Tunes were a thing, and apparently they do so by giving Sony animators- who include some very good animators- the chance to get out of the thumb of the vile cancerous cesspool that is Sony corporate. Storks was actually a result of this weird relationship too- you know, that other surprisingly good film that was well reviewed but that you probably didn't catch until later- and darned if both of these films don't actually most resemble the slapstick rhythm of the Clampett and early Jones shorts. Really, really good imaginative use of physical comedy, married to fairly complicated plots with somewhat complex morals... my jam, in other words. (Even if I found Smallfoot to be a little more... consistent? Even? I don't really know the word, but it is more that than Storks, even if Storks does have higher highs, i.e. the wolves, and a complete and wholehearted endorsement of non-traditional families.) As for how it'll do against Venom? ... I 'unno, actually. You're probably right that Venom will be the smasher this weekend (the minute I saw the "turd in the wind" thing, I knew it would make a bajillion dollars  I don't think'k I'll go, but some people do genuinely like that edgy bullshit and lots of others love a trainwreck), but maybe it'll have staying power.
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Oct 2, 2018 19:06
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Pick posted:Storks was awful. ???? I admit that it was too frenetic in places which strained the emotional connection and some jokes didn't really work... but what about it draws that response, exactly? It seemed cute and free of regressive messages to me! (was it the birds with teeth? 'Cause I admit that weirds me out too...)
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Oct 2, 2018 19:21
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Space Cadet Omoly posted:.....wait a minute, why HASN'T there ever been a gender swapped version of Beauty and the Beast?! I want to see that too, if only to see how certain people react to the concepts of a guy falling for a girl who, as well as not fitting the standard conventions of beauty, a) is far more powerful than him and b) saves his life multiple times, which c) he is completely OK with and totally unemasculated by. Can you imagine the wailing and gnashing of teeth?
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Oct 5, 2018 10:05
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Avalerion posted:Uh, Avatar? Doesn't really work; Neytiri is otherworldly, sure, but in a way that isn't imposing or offputting, and though Jake is out of his depth, he's also portrayed as super-capable, what with catching the super dangerous flying critter and all. An ideal lady-Beast should be taller, stronger- able to kill our Beau and (initially) willing to do so- maybe if Neytiri was more insectoid than feline and was many times bigger than the male counterparts... but now I'm kinda describing District 9 in which Wicus and Christopher Johnson are an item. Which, you know, is cool.
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Oct 5, 2018 14:15
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Pick posted:Go see Smallfoot, why are you guys not talking about it more, it’s like the best animated film of the last 3 years easily????? Right!? Right!? I always give big ups to a picture that surprises me, and I haven't been this surprised by a kids movie since Megamind, I think. It still kind of boggles my mind that such a completely low-key movie being sold as a cute, colorful way to waste an hour and change is such a superior version of the same story Wreck-It Ralph tried and ultimately failed to tell. Pick posted:e: And the song about the flow of information is completely loving sick, that entire scene is killer. That's one of the best scenes I've ever seen in an animated film.  The use of color, the cinematography and set design*... I'm really, really tempted to just post the entire thing here as an object lesson of This Is How You Do That Sort Of Thing, but that would be a massive spoiler and I do want this film to do well so they make more like it. (But if you absolutely must find out what the big deal is... the song's name is Let It Lie. Beware spoilers)*One of the best things about this movie is how nice the Yeti community is to look at pretty much all the time, every aspect just bursting with creativity and humor.
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Oct 8, 2018 00:32
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Renoistic posted:I really don't want to look at those yeti designs for a whole movie. It's probably the lack of noses. OK, OK, I'm trying to be non-committal about all this, but between this comics and at least one really special review on RT, the art nerd in me has just flared the gently caress up. Why are some people hung up on the drat nose thing? It's an artistic style! It's not like they're going for photo-realism here, as there are no real yetis to take reference from. It's not even like they're the first artists in history to downplay the nose or even leave it out; the Japanese, for example, have entire artistic styles in which the nose is not particularly pronounced, mostly on women to match the standards of beauty but sometimes on the men too (I'm talking mostly about ukiyo-e paintings, or even some of the later Shin Hanga style paintings of the early 20th). Is all that art to be dismissed too, because they got no noses, or there are mystical creatures that don't exist, or the painted scenes don't even seem to be taking place on any sort of ground (Floating World, don'tcha know)? You can see this art-style's influence in the videogame art of Yoshitaka Amano, which in turn influences the other art of Final fantasy... Are you saying you aren't going to play Final Fantasy Tactics, one of the greatest PS1 FF games and a contender for greatest overall FF game, because no noses? Look, if most yetis had noses and one or two did not and this discrepancy went unremarked upon, that would be one thing; you might call that sloppy or arguably another statement, depending on how it is portrayed. But just complaining about no noses because no noses is like complaining about musicals having coordinated song and dance numbers because "real people don't do that." And it's like... Yeah? No poo poo? You have found an Unrealistic Element- whaddya want, a medal? It's just the conventions of the genre, and if you get fixated on that sort of thing, you're going to have a hard time with that genre.
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Oct 8, 2018 12:48
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Renoistic posted:I didn't read all that, but I'm not justifying my views or anything. I just think they're ugly and unappealing. Not even ugly-cute or anything. It's like if Disney made a Frozen sequel with only the trolls. Or Olafs. Or, God forbid, the Minions. You should have read at least some of it. I wasn't really yelling at you or calling out your taste; I might not agree, but if you don't like something, you don't like it. You had just mentioned the lack of noses and I remembered some reviews I had read and got on my soapbox a bit. I'm also not really comparing Smallfoot and FFT; beyond s common artistic choice, they're apples and oranges.
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Oct 8, 2018 17:10
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ConfusedUs posted:The thing I remember most about All Dogs Go to Heaven is that the scene where Charlie goes to hell scared the poo poo out of me as a kid. Oh, yes. It's odd; when I was younger, I really liked The Land Before Time and An American Tail while not really liking All Dogs, finding it too... scary? Adult? Boring? I can't really put my finger on why I didn't like it anymore, but now that I'm older, I might actually think All Dogs might actually be one of my favorite animated movies (yes, the alligator bit and all), while Land Before Time and Tail are... uneven, even if I do still have a fondness for them. Land before Time, in particular, feels particularly lacking, especially since I've read about what Bluth really wanted to do and wish I could see that movie instead... and as has been mentioned, you can really, really see where the studio took the butcher knife. One of the reasons is that All Dogs has teeth; the scary bits are meant to be scary, and Charlie is a genuinely jagged, complicated protagonist for a kids movie. He's not a "jerk with a heart of gold," he's actually really a complete jerk who is punished multiple times for his jerkiness in really dark, horrifying ways. Rewatching An American Tail, it's... OK from the perspective of Fievel's journey to get back home, and like that other person said, in every Don Bluth joint, there is at least a couple of moments of really good animation, but you see all of these moments that could have been so much better with a little teeth. For example, they show how immigrants to America were given anglicized names (Fievel= Filly et al) but that's... all they do. They don't comment on it at all, nor do any of the New World elements (crooked sweatshop owners, glad-handing Tammany politicians, street toughs, political agitators) get examined much further than just another obstacle for Fievel to get over- gotta get back to them cats, after all. And the result is a pretty interesting picaresque to watch once for being famous, and then probably not again. And because it's also been brought up: I saw Antz. This is all I remember from it- Woody Allen as an ant goes to therapy, has a dance number, almost gets crushed by a quarter, and then somehow brings down a fascist.
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Oct 9, 2018 13:57
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Wheat Loaf posted:I imagine that was meant to be more visceral than they were able to do at the time - you know, I feel like they probably wanted to show the ants melting like the Wicked Witch when the termites sprayed them with acid, instead of groaning slightly and staggering about a bit with gunge on them like celebrity guests on Noel's House Party. Wow, I don't remember that part at all. And oh look, it's on Netflix, and it's a slow day at work... OK, let's see if it holds up.
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Oct 9, 2018 17:39
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So I watched Antz again during work. It's... a movie, all right. Scattered thoughts I jotted down: -who is this for? Woody Allen trying to be both his usual mostly nihilist, "god is dead so what's the point" comedic self and simultaneously the protagonist of a follow-your-dreams children's movie doesn't really work, because the latter is supposed to want things and have a tangible dream they want to follow, and the former... just wants to complain about how how awful everything is. Yeah, that’s… something the kids can relate to, all right… -and all that in addition to a satire about military dictatorships? How is a kid supposed to enjoy this, exactly -In "A taste of things to come" news, we got references to popular culture, some of which is charmingly dated: Star wars reference, magnifying glass as Independence day parody, Allen singing Almost Like Being In Love, which at least isn't loving Smashmouth) -some scenes are hard to parse, like the battlefield scenes: don't know if they're meant to be serious or parodies, and they clash with the rest. clashing is the word of the day, really; Allen is trying to be sympathetic while also engaging in his humor, which is as it has ever been: 75% being a huge creep -I guess I do have to give the animation props- this is the second CGI-animated feature ever, and some of the effects are pretty nice. But you can see the template being set for celebrity driven features that would be followed for years afterward, often to their detriment. Anhd yes, it's the formula that brought us Kung Fu Panda, Shrek, and Megamind, but... it also brought us everything else. -it is really mean at times, but to no real purpose; it doesn't build character or reinforce a theme, or even move the story along. Perhaps that's the byproduct of being motivated by spite; Katzenberg had just formed the company in 1994 and was still talking with Lasseter and Stanton. And he was apparently part of that famous lunch in which the ideas for A Bugs Life and a bunch of other of their ideas... and hey ho whaddya know, in 1996, Dreamworks was working on its very own ant themed movie, which premiered in 1998. Soo.... Did Katz ram this thing through so as to beat A Bugs Life and even his own film (The Prince of Egypt) to theaters?  I didn't like it.
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Oct 9, 2018 23:13
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Aces High posted:I liked Antz more as a kid because the ants were modeled with 6 legs instead of 4. Actually I saw it first, didn't see A Bug's Life until...poo poo I can't remember when, I don't think I saw it in theatres. Regardless, when I did finally see it I was very confused why all the insects did not have 6 legs, besides the grasshoppers, when that was something that Antz got right. This is one of the only thing about Antz I really did like, but beyond the ant queen being associated with birth, that's where the attention to biology ends*. Beyond that it's all the exploration of themes using the backdrop of an ant colony: the use of a fictional story to establish the morals of "it is no crime to be innovative, even if it breaks tradition", "heroism is a pretense until the lie becomes true because heroes are made, not born" and "bullies and parasites cannot be appeased and if you try you're playing their game" in A Bug's Life, vs... vague comparisons to the daily grind of work using an ant colony, an arbitrary conflict between worker ants and soldier ants that gets forgotten, and a protagonist who has no dreams beyond being recognized and who doesn't really change, the perception of him does. The former just feels more focused and reinforced, while the latter just kind of is... and I guess it is memorable for how weird it is, but that doesn't really make it good. *Which annoys me, to be honest. I get that anthropomorphization is part and parcel to kids stories because it's recognizable and being mammals we would respond most positively to mammalian values, but... why exactly would an insect like an ant care very much about the potential thousands of children they would have? Why would a queen, who gives birth to pretty much every other ant in the colony, prioritize two of those children as actually heirs apparent, when depending on the species, there could be hundreds of other potentially fertile females? And then of course, we treat these as a traditional monarchy, another things that makes no sense from an insectoid perspective... I get that these are movies for children, but there's no exploration of what family and friends, or society, would look like from an actual ants point of view. So they wouldn't have a traditional family- would they have friends? Rivalries? What would they look like and what form would they take? Speculation, I guess, but there is a place for speculating in children's entertainment!
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Oct 10, 2018 13:54
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Mechafunkzilla posted:The TMNT movie kinda owns though There are parts of the TMNT movie that own, yes, and even more parts of the sequel that owned harder... but they were attached to movies that did not own, and are in fact boring, drab slogs that did not have the same courage of conviction that the own-y bits did. This and the acting of the live action characters... or perhaps the acting direction, not sure which. And some reviewers are good, it's just a matter of following the ones that suit your taste and make sound arguments.
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Nov 29, 2018 16:59
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