Movie Recommendations

[Moejoe]

News just in. The plot for AVATAR 2: Revenge of the Cat-Smurfs

As Avatar 1 was so ground breaking plot wise, and some of its fans were a little confused with the complexity of the relationships and tended to short out their 3D glasses as they drooled, Cameron is opening up the story of Avatar 2: Revenge of the Cat Smurfs in an attempt to even more cynically milk money from the audience. Avatar 2: Revenge of the Cat Smurfs, is reputed to cost only 1 billion dollars this time around, but the vast majority of this money will go on Cameron's new technology 'Lobotom-eee' a radical technique where all thought and critical thinking is removed from the audience members, so that they can more easily enjoy the movie experience. Free lobster bibs for all!

Exlcusive screenshot:



*Oh and you did wake me, I was watching a bootleg copy of Avatar and I was brain dead for a moment there. So thanks

[omk3]

Am I the only one who finds Avatar ugly? I can't stand the look of these blue creatures, whatever they are. I haven't watched it - my aesthetic opinion is based on trailers and posters, but it's enough to make me want to avoid it (along with the hype).

[vivaldirules]

Originally Posted by omk3

Am I the only one who finds Avatar ugly? I can't stand the look of these blue creatures, whatever they are. I haven't watched it - my aesthetic opinion is based on trailers and posters, but it's enough to make me want to avoid it (along with the hype).

Although I didn't find the creatures ugly, I did find most of the artwork, or whatever it would be properly called, to be rather off-putting. The main character stepping on the vegetation and it lighting up was a rather childish idea and poorly done. The images of the landscape showing a forest in fog seemed rather amateurish. The facial expressions of the blue people were cartoonish. I'm guessing that a lot of money was spent on technical delivery of the images we see and not on artistry. Aside from the spectacle of it all, I am puzzled what people see in the movie.

[Moejoe]

Originally Posted by vivaldirules

Although I didn't find the creatures ugly, I did find most of the artwork, or whatever it would be properly called, to be rather off-putting. The main character stepping on the vegetation and it lighting up was a rather childish idea and poorly done. The images of the landscape showing a forest in fog seemed rather amateurish. The facial expressions of the blue people were cartoonish. I'm guessing that a lot of money was spent on technical delivery of the images we see and not on artistry. Aside from the spectacle of it all, I am puzzled what people see in the movie.

Nearly every review of the film is the same. Plot is bland, acting so-so, but the 'experience' is astounding. It doesn't hold up well as a film or a story once you take away the hype and the glasses. Then again, and I've said it before, Cameron is not a good screenwriter, it was his partnership with Gale Anne Hurd that brought out the best scripts. She brought all the intelligence, the emotion and the heart to the stories that made Cameron famous.

The worst thing about all this is that we're going to see a glut of 3D 'event' movies over the next few years as the bankrupt minds in Hollywood latch onto another fad. The only place to see any real stories anymore is in the indie offsprings of the majors, like the stuff that comes out of Sony Classics and Focus. That, and of course, the indie produced stuff itself. Slamdance starts soon, and that always has some good films worthy of attention: http://www.slamdance.com/

[WT Sharpe]

Originally Posted by Moejoe

Nearly every review of the film is the same. Plot is bland, acting so-so, but the 'experience' is astounding. It doesn't hold up well as a film or a story once you take away the hype and the glasses. Then again, and I've said it before, Cameron is not a good screenwriter, it was his partnership with Gale Anne Hurd that brought out the best scripts. She brought all the intelligence, the emotion and the heart to the stories that made Cameron famous.

The worst thing about all this is that we're going to see a glut of 3D 'event' movies over the next few years as the bankrupt minds in Hollywood latch onto another fad. The only place to see any real stories anymore is in the indie offsprings of the majors, like the stuff that comes out of Sony Classics and Focus. That, and of course, the indie produced stuff itself. Slamdance starts soon, and that always has some good films worthy of attention: http://www.slamdance.com/

I still haven't seen Avatar, but many of the animated 3D films I have seen recently have been excellent. I'm thinking of films like Up, Monsters vs. Aliens, and Coraline (which I saw in 2D, but is was a 3D movie). They had heart, and scripts that could be appreciated by all age groups.

Of course, having an 10 year old grandchild living with us has helped determine many of our recent movie night decisions.

The new 3D is far superior to the old stuff, and I see no reason why it can't be taken seriously by serious film makers. Done right, and used as another tool in the arsenal rather than the centerpiece of the film, it can enhance the story and bring a new dimension of reality to the movie going experience.

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Originally Posted by Moejoe

Nearly every review of the film is the same. Plot is bland, acting so-so, but the 'experience' is astounding. It doesn't hold up well as a film or a story once you take away the hype and the glasses. Then again, and I've said it before, Cameron is not a good screenwriter, it was his partnership with Gale Anne Hurd that brought out the best scripts. She brought all the intelligence, the emotion and the heart to the stories that made Cameron famous.

Like Aliens? Avatar, like Cameron's immensely popular Aliens, is simply an action film, 2009's answer to Star Wars (and without Hurd's co-writing). As such, it really doesn't matter that the script isn't deep or inspired... it's simply the vehicle, the spectacle's the thing. Personally, I enjoyed it, and I liked the Pandora environment (obviously patterned after marine animals and environments... I think of Pandora as a "water world without the water"), and I wasn't bothered by the "blue people".

Originally Posted by Moejoe

The worst thing about all this is that we're going to see a glut of 3D 'event' movies over the next few years as the bankrupt minds in Hollywood latch onto another fad.

Maybe. But they are also offering Avatar 2-D, which is how I saw it... and honestly, I don't regret not seeing it in 3-D (for one thing, I'm told the visuals are clearer in 2-D). We may get action-adventure, horror, etc, in 3-D, but it's not needed for every genre... and it's more expensive to-boot. As long as we have movies besides the mega-million blockbusters, we'll have 2-D movies for awhile.

And after all, no one's forcing people to go to the "event" movies... if enough people say "Ehh... I'll pass," the studios will get the message. So it's up to us now.

[mores]

Originally Posted by omk3

Am I the only one who finds Avatar ugly? I can't stand the look of these blue creatures, whatever they are. I haven't watched it - my aesthetic opinion is based on trailers and posters, but it's enough to make me want to avoid it (along with the hype).

You had to get used to them. At first I was kind of frightened, somewhat revolted and at the same time aroused at their nakedness After 2 hours my brain just got used to them I guess, because I was able to focus on their emotions and not their hideousness.

Originally Posted by vivaldirules

The main character stepping on the vegetation and it lighting up was a rather childish idea and poorly done. The images of the landscape showing a forest in fog seemed rather amateurish. The facial expressions of the blue people were cartoonish. I'm guessing that a lot of money was spent on technical delivery of the images we see and not on artistry. Aside from the spectacle of it all, I am puzzled what people see in the movie.

Well, the lighting up of fluorescent life forms is just like a boat stirring up algae that begins to glow.
But I wonder why you think the facial expressions were cartoonish - of course we do not have "real" 3m tall blue people to compare the movie to, but I thought the faces were pretty well done, not exaggerated or otherwise "unnatural". I think I remember reading that a lot of the money went into this "awesome" new 3D-face-expression technology.

[vivaldirules]

Originally Posted by mores

But I wonder why you think the facial expressions were cartoonish - of course we do not have "real" 3m tall blue people to compare the movie to, but I thought the faces were pretty well done, not exaggerated or otherwise "unnatural". I think I remember reading that a lot of the money went into this "awesome" new 3D-face-expression technology.

Cartoonish might be a poor word choice, but I think I mentioned elsewhere here that I thought they did a better job on Gollum in LOTR than they did with Avatar as far as giving characters emotional facial expressions. In Avatar, about all I registered were "anger", "love", "fear", and "disappointment" which was a pretty limited set of emotions and it came off rather boring, I thought. There was hardly any emotion at all. In LOTR, it was really rather fascinating to see Gollum in the sequences where he fought with himself, and that was using technology that is now primitive compared to Avatar's.

[Moejoe]

Originally Posted by WT Sharpe

I still haven't seen Avatar, but many of the animated 3D films I have seen recently have been excellent. I'm thinking of films like Up, Monsters vs. Aliens, and Coraline (which I saw in 2D, but is was a 3D movie). They had heart, and scripts that could be appreciated by all age groups.

Of course, having an 10 year old grandchild living with us has helped determine many of our recent movie night decisions.

The new 3D is far superior to the old stuff, and I see no reason why it can't be taken seriously by serious film makers. Done right, and used as another tool in the arsenal rather than the centerpiece of the film, it can enhance the story and bring a new dimension of reality to the movie going experience.

There's the problem I have with Avatar in a nutshell...the CGI isn't used properly. It's jarring going from one environment to the other, and it has that 'silver' sheen that most CGI tends to have now. Let's forget the pathetic story of Avatar for a moment (which has been argued quite more elquently by others as just another 'white man saves the day' fable akin to Disney's racist Pochahontas retelling or the 70's 'Man Called Horse' franchise) and focus on the effects themselves. If Avatar had been all Na'vi from the beginning, no human counterpoint, I might have felt more immersion, but as it stands the character design and CGI doesn't work in counterpoint. It's too distracting. It's too cartoonish, and add the simplistic and ridiculous storyline to that and you have, what I think, is a hollow film.



To be frank, I probably wouldn't have liked this film if all the glaring flaws weren't present and it had been shot traditionally. I'm not a big 'action sci-fi' person and I can't remember an outright Fantasy that I enjoyed. And this, if everyone is honest, isn't sci-fi, it's a fantasy film.

Now this is CGI I can get behind

[omk3]

First picture - UGLY!
Second picture - so cute! what is it? it looks like something I'd like to watch.

Generally I admit I don't like 3d at all - I'm talking about 3d that tries to look realistic. Take games. Every action or adventure game out in the last few years is "realistic" 3d - which for me means awkward and uninteresting (to say the least). But then, if you see how telltale for example used 3d in sam and max, monkey island, wallace and gromit, yes, that's a great use for 3d. It's 3d you don't even notice.
Using 3d to replace actors for any length of time (other than extremely dangerous scenes for example) makes no sense to me.

[vivaldirules]

Originally Posted by Moejoe

To be frank, I probably wouldn't have liked this film if all the glaring flaws weren't present and it had been shot traditionally. I'm not a big 'action sci-fi' person and I can't remember an outright Fantasy that I enjoyed.

Let me chime in with Moejoe and qualify my opinions with the fact that I, too, have not been a big fan of many sci-fi/fantasy films. When I saw Star Wars when it came out (1975?) I was absolutely pissed off that Lucas wasted all those incredible skills. I wanted to see a cool drama set in a futuristic setting and instead he gave us a fun western shoot-em-up in space. Of course, I am long since over that and now think that Lucas gave us something decent. But I still like my sci-fi more in the vein of Solaris than Star Wars or Avatar.

[Moejoe]

Originally Posted by omk3

First picture - UGLY!
Second picture - so cute! what is it? it looks like something I'd like to watch.

That is the excellent (IMHO) Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs

[Moejoe]

Originally Posted by vivaldirules

Let me chime in with Moejoe and qualify my opinions with the fact that I, too, have not been a big fan of many sci-fi/fantasy films. When I saw Star Wars when it came out (1975?) I was absolutely pissed off that Lucas wasted all those incredible skills. I wanted to see a cool drama set in a futuristic setting and instead he gave us a fun western shoot-em-up in space. Of course, I am long since over that and now think that Lucas gave us something decent. But I still like my sci-fi more in the vein of Solaris than Star Wars or Avatar.

I still like Star Wars, but less and less the more Lucas messes with it, to the point now where I don't even own a copy any more because I can't get the 'true' original (it's one of my earliest cinema memories, so it has nostalgia value for me). I do believe Lucas squandered his talent on becoming a marketer, and this was the same man who made THX1138, a tour-de-force science-fiction film (real science fiction, not science fantasy). I still believe the 1970's was the best decade for most films, a kind of 'peak oil' for mainstream creativity.

[omk3]

Originally Posted by Moejoe

That is the excellent (IMHO) Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs

Lovely title too
Jotted down on a long "to seek out and watch" list.

[vivaldirules]

Originally Posted by Moejoe

I still like Star Wars, but less and less the more Lucas messes with it, to the point now where I don't even own a copy any more because I can't get the 'true' original (it's one of my earliest cinema memories, so it has nostalgia value for me). I do believe Lucas squandered his talent on becoming a marketer, and this was the same man who made THX1138, a tour-de-force science-fiction film (real science fiction, not science fantasy). I still believe the 1970's was the best decade for most films, a kind of 'peak oil' for mainstream creativity.

I loved THX1138. My hope was that since that was Lucas' first real film (didn't he do that as a school project?) that it is a close reflection of the movies he'd really like to make and that he might return to that type of film now that the Star Wars stuff is behind him. I'm still waiting and hoping.