Movies (recently seen)

[Dragavan]

I love that movie. Wasn't sold on it at first, but by the time the first real Troll encounter finished I was all in. And the start of that sequence when the hunter comes running out of the forest and just screams "TROLL!" at the camera made me laugh so hard.

[Locke]

I may see Troll Hunter now.


Saw Girl with the Dragon Tattoo a few days ago. I thought the book was readable, but not great (I don't get why it's been so heavily praised/bought, unless it's the abuse of women angle). The movie was mostly very slow and dull. I didn't like the music (Trent Reznor), and the scenes were usually dark/shadowy. It has a long runtime, but does stay true to the book, for what that's worth.

I didn't mention it, but I saw Contagion at some point awhile back. It's about as good as a disease movie can get. Nothing you wouldn't expect in terms of plot, but the visuals/production values were outstanding, so much so that I enjoyed it on the strength of its aesthetics rather than what was happening on screen.

[Vesnic]

I didn't mention it, but I saw Contagion at some point awhile back. It's about as good as a disease movie can get. Nothing you wouldn't expect in terms of plot, but the visuals/production values were outstanding, so much so that I enjoyed it on the strength of its aesthetics rather than what was happening on screen.

I thought The Crazies was a pretty good example of a disease movie too. It had some awesome make-up work which was designed to look specifically "disease-y" rather than zombified or otherwise alien. I think the idea of the familiar and harmless suddenly turning on you is one of the few tropes in horror that always works on a purely psychological level. I'd rate it high for aesthetics and it even had a decent plot and acting. It's probably been mentioned here before by End, but I thought I'd bring it up again since we're on the topic of disease flicks and I haven't seen any euro-fag hits recently with which to torture you all.

[End Master]

Which The Crazies did you see, the original or the remake? I liked them both, but I give the edge to the remake.

One thing that I thought the original did better though was not every crazy was a homicidal psycho (Most still were of course). They had a little more variety and showed a few of them having harmless crazy behavior (Like sweeping up a grass field for instance) or in one case plain old sexual deviancy.

[Vesnic]

Which The Crazies did you see, the new one or the remake?

I saw the new one. Loved the British guy putting on a somewhat convincing Southern, if perhaps not specifically Iowa accent. I'm sad to have missed out on some of the more varied Crazies behavior though. In the commentaries they mentioned that the original film divided its POV pretty equally between the townspeople and the military, while the new one was shot strictly from the perspective of the sheriff and his little gang of (mostly non-) goonies.

That whole sweeping a field thing reminds me of a blonde joke:

Q: Why did the blonde break her arm?

A: She was raking leaves when she fell out of the tree.

Tee hee!

[End Master]

Bah, that should've been "did you see the original or the remake?" but doesn't matter, since you knew what I meant.

Heard they were going to do an american remake of Troll Hunter, which seems like a bad idea in this case. It's fine the way it is and the troll lore/myths don't fit the americas. (I'm guessing they'll shove an american camera crew in Norway or something)

The Girl With The Dragon Tatoo movie just didn't look all that interesting to me when I saw the trailers, so I guess I'll continue to skip it. I want to finally get around to watching 13 Assassins sometime soon anyway.

[Dragavan]

13 Assassins was surprisingly good. I don't normally go for those kinds of movies, but it was better than I expected.

[Vesnic]

Speaking of Nordic gloom and the urge to remake what's already been done, I just watched Valhalla Rising on DVD. It's like the legendary Aguirre, except with a great deal of violence that is both gratuitous and misplaced, some very threadbare philosophical underpinnings, and a self-awareness that borders on preciousness. I'm not sure why so many films these days seem to have had the color leeched right out of them, but it doesn't say much for a movie that literally has to darken its palette in order to convey a sense of dread. The overall impression I got was that the filmmaker first saw Aguirre a long time ago, has loved it for years, and remade it with his own unique personal stamp, not the least of which is a cast of "Vikings" consisting almost entirely of Scots. The imitation, however, is vague and thin, silent where it should speak and ultimately unconvinced of its own purpose. Long passages took place utterly without explanation, only to be cut short by a sudden, loud impact of some blunt metal object crushing someone's skull. No expense was spared in making the death and gore as vivid and inescapable as possible. While this might have jolted me on three separate occasions from the stupor this movie otherwise induced, it never built up any tension or fear that could go on being felt even in the most seemingly innocuous of situations. In Aguirre, the mere sight of a tree swaying in the wind could be pants-pissingly terrifying.

Valhalla Rising is clumsy and trite, a non-recommend.

[donteatpoop]

Just watched Defiance last night.

Holy shit. Excellent fucking movie. Gripping drama, exciting action, great acting, easy to identify with characters. Bad ass movie.

[Locke]

I did see a zombie movie called "The Horde" that wasn't bad for what it was. Amusing if you see it with the right crowd.

[Vesnic]

Wtf?

There are lots of trends in the movie world that I find pretty disturbing: the increasing vapidity of all movies, not just the big blockbusters, but the more "intimate" or "indie" ones as well; the apparently indomitable downward slide in acting ability, especially in American film, where even the supposedly talented young actors seem to be more concerned about getting their good angle on screen than about making even the slightest attempts at real emotional resonance; the crapification of our cinemas with unbridled cell-phone use, that newest of tacitly accepted cultural phenomena, and the mysterious trend in cranking the volume so high, the speakers distort and you start to wonder if that tinnitus is indicative of permanent hearing loss.

There are two things especially that I noticed in my last venture to the local Regal Cinema. First of all, what is the deal with re-releasing old movies that have already had their day and made their money, only this time in 3D? I suppose I am negatively biased since I happen to fall into that not statistically insignificant proportion of the population (about 10%) that cannot see 3D properly. I go in with the glasses, but rather than making the image "pop", they just darken it. However, even for my more binocularly inclined friends, it seems like a terrible gyp to spend eleven dollars on a movie that you've already seen and maybe even bought on VHS or DVD, just so you can reach out and fondle Nemo's tender little tummy. Do they really think we're that stupid and anxious to part with our hard-earned money, especially in today's world of sinking wages and high unemployment? The answer would seem to be a resounding YES! However, I have a very difficult time getting over the immense insult being dealt to me by these "gilded palaces of sin" making unfathomable amounts of money on less and less effort. It's at moments like these that living in Inverse Proportion World really rubs me raw. Their ever-declining commitment to anything like quality or artistry somehow delivers profits undreamed of just a few years ago, when movies were still being made that might actually have deserved said profits.

Baffling.

Another trend, which isn't exactly new, but is still in my book obnoxious and highly suspect, is the intense upswing in the number of films that could rightly be called "propaganda". They have been advertising a movie called Act of Valor, all about real Navy Seals and their admittedly hammy inability to perform, for so long that I assumed the movie had already come and gone and I had miraculously missed it. Such is not the case, however; like one of those over-long Memorial Day parades, the Sousa-march prelude has merely stretched itself out to lengths so extensive, they come full circle. I fear that we are now suspended in an endless loop of rah-rah militarism and special-interest spending that has abducted and absconded with what was once known as the entertainment industry. Just as making 3D versions of pre-existing films is an easy way to make a buck, so is hiring a bunch of actual Navy Seals who won't command Christian Bale's millions to make a movie about themselves: slacker-level input in, massive profit out. Even when this particular piece of pain has arrived and subsequently vanished into the annals of forgotten history, I know I will still be subjected to those deafening commercials for the National Guard which they insist on playing before just about every movie at Regal. If I'm going to be forced into deafness, I would much prefer losing my hearing in some ecstasy of incredible music than by the military-industrial complex having its rough way with my eardrums.

What happened to anti-war movies? I don't mean namby-pamby liberal weeper-fests that just seem to add fuel to the Neo-con fire (though of course this begs an entirely different question), but real, manly, shoot-em'-up war movies that nonetheless manage to leave their audiences with a deep feeling of sick in the pit of the stomach. No one will forget the famous Russian roulette scenes from The Deer Hunter, nor will they forget the terror inspired by these images of humanity gone utterly off the rails. Nowadays, I can see them doing a remake of such a classic, except this time hiring real infantry instead of the greatest young actors of their generation, skipping out on the whole war-actually-hurts-quite-a-bit thing in favor of blood-n'-guts glory and, most naturally of all...

presenting it all in awesome, surround-sound, HD, fist-in-yo'-face ...

3D!!!!

[Locke]

Hey, we agree on something.

[Vesnic]

Hey, we agree on something.

Oh Locke, you silly savage--sometimes I think it is our remarkable similarity which makes us chafe one against the other like a pair of corpulent thighs.

[End Master]

Preaching to the choir about 3D, I'm not a big fan of it, but I haven't really been keeping up with the war movies lately. I haven't even heard of the one you're talking about.

But don't they usually put in an anti-war message in most war movies nowadays? Seems like there are always a few scenes where the protagonist or some character will go on a monologue about how they hate fighting or they don't find any pleasure in it.

Granted it probably isn't a very deep message other than "war is bad".

[ChubbyTeletubby]

Meh. I don't think some of these movies are THAT bad. I think we're just inundated with a lot MORE movies and such these days, and of course there's going to be a LOT of crap. But there's still gems out there. I don't think the acting abilities of these (admittedly overpayed and overrated in most cases)....actors....has diminished. Necessarily. There's a lot of old movies where the acting is awful. Over-acting I call it. They did that a lot in the olden days of yore.

And television has actually gotten BETTER. The shows have gotten SMARTER in many cases (Look at AMC and others). Now OF COURSE there's TONS of trash on our screens. But that's cause we're inundated with WAAAAY more options. So of course there's going to be crap.

As far as the 3d stuff goes...well. I happen to enjoy it. Especially if I've gobbled some magic mushrooms. It really makes the experience memorable. I saw Avatar once in the theater. I payed my eleven dollars and had one of the best movie experiences of my life, even though the plot was AWFUL. The theater I go to is also REALLY REALLY nice and it's just down the street. It's like the nicest theater in Kentucky (which isnt saying much I know but Louisville is a pretty big metropolitan area) Do they over-charge? OF COURSE! That's the name of the game.

The craftsmanship of the visuals was to be applauded. Some real hard work went into these movies. It's the unsung heroes behind the scenes that deserve the applause.

And there you have.

*sips his brandy slowly*

Ahhh,


EDIT: Saw I Am Thor. Kinda liked it.