Sin City
Hmmm.
J has wanted to see this film for a long time, and I thought it looked interesting too – quite like film noir usually, and such a fantastic cast (Bruce Willis, Clive Owen, Mickey Rourke, Rosaria Dawson…)! I must say that I hadn’t heard very much about it before we saw it, except that it was black and white with bits of colour. I wish now that I had been a bit more prepared – well, the dude at the theatre warned me a bit, saying it was gruesome, but still. It was very good: fascinating and intertwined stories, very well done as an adaption of a graphic novel because that’s just what it looked like, and the colour was superbly done. However. Gruesome and not a little grotesque; I had not realised that it is rated MA+. I would definitely have to think before I recommended it to anyone.
The Island
Someone I know described this as The Rock (Sean Connery, Nicholas Cage) meets Minority Report, with a little bit of Matrix thrown in. Pretty much. I liked the story, and I thought it was developed well; the characters were mostly quite realistic, and the acting was great – Steve Buscemi is, as ever, very good, although I wouldn’t have recognised Sean Bean until the end if I hadn’t seen his name in the credits, since mostly he looks (unusually) very slick.
Overall, worthwhile. Some superfluous explosions and chases, and some scenes that just made me impatient because of their patent absurdity, but those were fairly minor. The ending… well, you can probably imagine. It is Hollywood, after all.
Hitchhikers’ Guide
I liked it. I don’t really mind that much that they changed the story a bit – even putting in new bits – because the story is so completely flipped out that it would be impossible to film in the first place, and then no one would go and see even if it was filmed except for the really hard-core Adams fans, and most of them would be likely to be disappointed anyway. So, my thought is, at least this way they would have got a pretty good audience of both Adams-nuts and others, which might in turn get more people reading the books, which is all good.
I liked Jon Malkovitch is Harma Kavula. He was cool. And the guy who played Zaphod – so, so perfect.
National Treasure
We saw this on the weekend. It was about as silly as expected; attempting, in some ways, to mimic Last Crusade – but at least there, it was clear where the treasure had come from, and the clues made a modicum of movie-sense. The same cannot be said, alas, for this movie. It was entertaining, I’ll admit, and Nic Cage was not nearly so painful as he might have been; Sean Bean was a lot of fun and could have had a lot bigger part, in my mind. I might watch it again… in maybe 5 years, when I’m in the mood to be mildly amused.
Dungeons and Dragons, and Dark Crystal
With J out tonight, I’ve got a couple of flicks I want to see but J probably wouldn’t: at the moment I’m watching D&D. I’ve never played it, but I’ve wanted to see it since it came out – love those dragons (it has made me more determined to, at some stage, actually get around to writing my survey of dragons in literature, and maybe to extend it to films…). Anyway; enjoying it so far. I thought I recognised Ridley, the main character, and turns out it’s Jimmy from Lois and Clarke – I did think he was a spunk when I watched the show.
Later that same night
“So talented, eh Mr Ridley”… love a bit of movie-within-movie referencing. Speaking of which, they obviously couldn’t think of a more impressive way of doing magic swordfights than the lightsaber trick.
This was a pretty crap movie, as expected. Dagomar was probably the one redeeming character – a far more interesting villain than Profean, who was such a waste of Jeremy Irons. Thora Birch was a try-hard version of the Empress in Neverending Story; tell me, how would a teenage empress get to hearing about ideals of democracy and be convinced that they were a good idea? The dwarf was pathetic; the elf had potential, except for that breastplate, which was exactly that. And Marina… well, we won’t even mention her.
I guess I was anticipating a fairly average movie, and I certainly wasn’t disappointed.
Yet later that same night
Seems to be the night for similarities to Neverending Story: the nasty chitinous beasties in Dark Crystal seem to be very similar to the equally nasty chitinous beasties in the sequel. I’m guessing that this might be the original, though, actually, because I think this is older even than the original.
I am enjoying it still – I think the last time I watched it was on the eve of my 19th birthday while I was at college. The main reason I remember that is because the next morning when I got up I discovered a remarkable portrait of Fizz-gig under my door, courtesy of Krick. I still think he is one of the cutest pets yet invented.
As the Chamberlain says, MMMmmm…
Movies of the last few weeks
Hmm, do you get the feeling I really haven’t blogged here in a while, and have a lot to say as a consequence?
I watched a little bit of Batman and Robin the other night. It just made me feel contemptuous. It didn’t even manage to be camp. Urgh.
Collateral was… well, a bit weird. A bit motion-sickness-inducing, actually, what with all the hand-held camera, let’s-make-it-feel-as-if-you’re-there action. An interesting storyline – a fascinating one in a lot of ways, actually – and Tom Cruise really was quite good; so was Jamie Foxx.
Finally saw Pitch Black, having seen The Chronicles of Riddick at the movies. To be honest, it must have been Vin himself pushing for the sequel, because the original really was nothing special except for his character, who I really quite liked. About the most interesting thing was that half the cast were Australian; probably it was filmed here. Oh, the lighting for the surface of the planet was also quite cool – might have been a result of a low budget, too, though.
Murder at 1600 was really nothing much to write about. Wesley was entertaining. I think the most interesting thing was them making him a Civil War buff, with his battle sets, and then it being incorporated into the film. That, and the fact that the next day I found out my Yr12 history teacher is also into doing those sorts of things, but possibly even more extremely.
Tears of the Sun
I watched this movie today because a good friend of mine suggested it as for a film study with my Human Rights class. I had intended that they do Cry Freedom – and we did watch it – but they didn’t like it, and many paid no attention, so I threw that out the window (it wasn’t my assignment anyway) and decided to find something else. And while this is fictional, I am so going with this; it’s a good movie, easy to watch – Cry Freedom was a bit too long and too old for most of the students to tolerate without a big incentive, and no an assignment is not a big enough incentive. Pretty brutal, too, which I think might be useful for the students to see… most hadn’t even heard of Sudan (“do you mean Saddam, miss?”) at the start of the semester, and that was when it was finally getting into the papers! Anyway… enough of that rant… it was a good movie.
Mars Attacks
Of course I’ve seen this before; I’m watching it right now to prepare for Film Studies. Very funny. I like it. Students might not get all the funny bits, though, since I’m sure most/all won’t have seen all that many old scifi movies such as this movie is based on. I’m sure there are lots of sly gags that I don’t get, because I haven’t seen the right movie.
Which reminds me: I don’t know how many times I’ve seen Independence Day, but I don’t remember ever noticing the start-up screen message and sound when Jeff Goldblum’s character, David, opens his laptop: “Good morning, Dave.” HA HA HA. I had to stop myself from laughing out loud in class since I didn’t think the kids would think it was that funny.
Dirty Dozen
When I was at the video store the other, I saw The Dirty Dozen: Next Mission. It had Lee Marvin, and Ernest Borgnine, and I thought that it might not be too bad. How wrong I was. It’s appaling; I’m watching it at the moment. Even Lee is wooden and stilted. Very sad. I’m blaming the script, personally; it’s very close to the original, in some ways, but with no panache; quite different in others, but really bad.
U-571
My goodness. I hadn’t realised how bad submarine movies could get. I guess we have been spoiled, with Red October and K-19: The Widowmaker, but still! Largely boring action bits that don’t compensate for no character development. Disappointing… and you hardly hear boo from Bon Jovi, so even that potentially entertaining bit is squished.
Pft. Boring.
Randomly Yours, Alex 