Normally I would spend a lot of time thinking over what I wanted to say on this subject and fussing over the content, but I'm going to try to simply speak my mind now, warts and all...
Okay, I'll start by saying that I am a huge fan of the first two games in the series and I was looking forward to playing the third and final chapter in this trilogy for months. I had the good fortune of having not played the first two games until last year due to not having a computer powerful enough to run them. (No, I didn't want the console versions)
Thus I was able to experience and enjoy both games and their DLCs all at once. I even went as far as to buy the collector's edition of Mass Effect 3, which I almost NEVER do because I don't generally care about art books and extra crap like that unless I can get it for the same price as the original bare bones game. The Collector's Edition came with DLC and a bunch of other extras, some of which I haven't figured out how to unlock (Wasn't I supposed to get a robot dog or something? Oh well.)
I played Mass Effect 3 over the past week and for the most part, I was really enjoying it. The decisions I had made in previous games more often than not carried over into this one and helped with my war effort to defeat the reapers. There were so many cameos that made me giddy as I recalled them from previous games, which I also replayed recently. There were a few gripes I had with the game while playing, such as the treatment of Rebecca Chambers, the almost completely pointless character of Diane Allers, and a few others but certainly nothing bad enough to ruin the game for me.
Then we reached the ending. Dear god, the ending. Now in three different colors with the same bitter taste! I'm not going to go into specifics but they basically gave us a Gainax ending times three and basically being a Paragon/Renegade meant absolute JACK SHIT when it was all said and done. It made little sense, it was disappointing and just utterly crushed the joy I had experienced playing it until that moment because it just felt unfinished, unsatisfying and just... UGH.
And I'm not the only one who feels this way. This is not one person whining about not getting the endings he wanted. There is currently a series of petitions, polls and campaigns underway for BioWare to release a patch or DLC that fixes the ending of this game. There is a great deal of outrage and hurt from the gaming community that has devoted so much love and time to this series and rightly so.
We know that Bioware has plans to release more DLC for Mass Effect 3 in the future. But if that DLC does nothing to fix the ending, I won't be buying them. I don't care if they flesh out the universe a little more, let us take over Omega with Aria, etc. I won't buy it because ultimately, it won't mean anything if they keep that ending. If Bioware doesn't care anymore, why the hell should I?
Does this mean I will never play a Mass Effect game again? Probably not. If Mass Effect 3's ending isn't fixed, I sure as hell won't be playing THAT game again but I can still get some sense of closure and satisfaction by replaying Mass Effect 1 & 2 and if I have to settle for that, I will. Also, I may be interested in future stores taking place in the Mass Effect universe without Shepard, but I'm definitely going to be more likely to check for any 'Mass Effect 4 ending leaked: It sucks!' type posts before I waste another 60 bucks and 50 hours of my life.
I do have some hope that Mass Effect 3's ending can be fixed. Fallout 3 changed the nonsensical and all too brief ending of their game with DLC when fans complained and while it didn't solve the problem of the lack of epilogues, at least Bethesda made the effort to appease their fans and give the game a more satisfying conclusion. Please make the same effort, Bioware. Please don't let one of the greatest game trilogies I have ever had the pleasure of playing end on such a bitter and hollow note.
11 March 2012
28 February 2012
But...why?
Look, I know that there's a ton of enmity towards the entire Twilight series. I absolutely understand it, even though I have loved ones whose opinions I trust telling me that the books are completely different than the movies and that I should give them a chance. I may even do that at some point, though I'm not planning to in the short-run.
I watched Breaking Dawn, Part 1 with the Rifftrax commentary over the previous weekend, purchasing the Rifftrax almost as soon as it was posted to the website. As far as a review goes, I enjoyed the Rifftrax to Breaking Dawn more than the Rifftrax for the previous three Twilight-series films. The callbacks that Mike, Kevin, and Bill referred to were good, and this movie had much more pretension to it than the previous three. I believe the pretension, and its overall grandiosity, came as a result of the decision to split the book into two parts... there really is zero subplot in the movie, so each and every plot point needs to be belabored as much as humanly possible, to tease out the storyline from about forty-five minutes of content to an hour and fifty-seven(!) minutes of content. The fact that Kristen Stewart, Robert Pattinson, and Taylor "Abduction" Lautner chew the majority of the screen throughout the film also tends to lead itself rather easily to riffs. The greatest example of the poor acting quotient is the collection of faces Kristen Stewart makes prior to her onscreen wedding... in the Rifftrax preview, it was ably skewered as a set of constipation faces. I would suggest fans to purchase this Rifftrax, especially if they have already seen movies one through three.
I wanted to dig deeper than this. So, here's the caveat: my challenge with this post is that I want to be respectful to those who like the books, especially since I am sure that many of them also support works and authors (and directors and musicians) that I also enjoy, and immersing yourself in art is always going to be beneficial. So, I'm not trying to bash or trash Stephenie Meyers or her works, just to explain why I am not the biggest fan.
To begin with, bad acting in a movie is going to turn people off from reading the book. The girl portrayed on the screen has very few redeeming qualities... to be truthful, there are two that I can possibly pinpoint... she seems as if she can be intelligent and she seems very dedicated. Of course, I can point to counterexamples of each, namely that it took forever for her to connect Edward --> vampire, and she managed to string along Jacob as a backup plan. From asking my Twilight source, in the books Bella doesn't exactly even have her looks to fall back on. The biggest and most important question I have with this series is, "Why Bella?" What makes her such a fun person to not only want to be around, but to spend large segments of your life with? On top of that, why should I, as the viewer/reader, care? This is a main character that I have zero interest in. It's not to say that books or stories are ruined with a bad main character, but a lot has to go right around the bad main character for the story to be successful. People familiar with MSTings may know the next term; Bella as portrayed on the screen is very close to the classic definition of a Mary Sue character. The only thing that possibly pulls her out of that consideration is that she's not idealized in the beginning. However, throughout the "saga", it is almost as if the author is telling us, "You HAVE to be interested in her because I am!" I may be contrarian half the time (and contrarian to being contrarian the other half), but for me to invest time and intelligence I need a corresponding return of reasons to continue investing. Why should I like her? How can I relate to her? Why should I care about her struggles? Fair warning: without answers, this leads to "So what?"
Another issue I'm nonplussed by is that they took archetypical creatures (vampires and werewolves) and completely changed the rules surrounding them. I daresay that this is just as large an issue as the Mary Sue above. In literature, cliches and stereotypes actually serve a very important role; they provide your reader with context that you don't have to busily backstory (and waste precious page space with overlong explanations) AND they also help to connect your book with the reader... "Hey, vampires, I like them!" Sharing experiences with the author helps to connect the reader.
---Quick aside: experience-sharing and filling cyphers seems to have driven the two most popular book series of the previous decade and a half. Harry Potter was not only having daring adventures, but kids could literally imagine themselves having his adventures. Same with Bella Swan, though to be frank she appeals to half of the population far easier than the other half, and the deliberate under-information as to her character makes it easier for many girls to place themselves in Bella's shoes.
Anyway, to continue the cliche examination, in Twilight, the cliches have been stood on their heads. Vampires can come out at daytime? The only reason they don't is because... they sparkle?! That takes a major limiting factor to a vampire's power and changes it from a handicap or a hurdle that must be overcome into a minor setback. Remember, why would we even care about Bella if not for her struggle, and if you take away reasons to generate struggle and conflict, that's a one-sentence explanation compared to multiple chapters of drama. Here though too, it takes something that could be a strength... a person's familiarity with a cliche, and turns it into something that will put people off. The werewolf rules got even more blurred, when their only limit to their power was having to be in either insanely-huge dog form or tearing their clothes. Full moons don't matter, nor does a werewolf's bite.
This leads into the next point. Previously-established rules are very lightly regarded in this universe. I do not know whether or not it was movie #3 or movie #4 that raised the issue of "imprinting" for werewolves... as if they were tiny ducklings(!), but it was brought to the forefront on Breaking Dawn. Jacob, after never having imprinted on Bella, imprints on the baby that comes out of Bella. They also implied in this movie that imprinting is something that is well-known and integral to a werewolf. Again, "!!!" regarding the busting of cliches above. However, that also puts the plot of movies 2 and 3 into a prism that I cared not to look at... why the holy heck did Jacob even attempt to pursue Bella romantically if he never imprinted on her? He had to know even from a young age about this "peculiarity" of "werewolves", right? Why waste all this energy on someone who not only has a boyfriend but that you also know you didn't immediately take to, and who you know you will have to relegate to a more minimal role when the imprinting happens on another person? (Yeah, yeah, "teenage angst"...) Maybe I'm reading the whole process incorrectly, but that becomes another one of the main issues with the storyline as written... if the writer can't adequately explain what's going on, that's not a failure of the reader. This is not a coded message, this is pretty central to the existence of one of the two mythical creatures the author altered from whole cloth.
Judging from the movies alone, there's very little subplot to engage your brain in other ways. Not all books need it, but it makes a very linear storyline. Subplot generates additional struggle, allows for other characters to take a brief amount of spotlight, and helps to allow tension to build in the main storyline and to give your readers a break from the otherwise unrelenting main characters. I recall one of the movies, don't remember which one, giving Jasper some backstory... and that was pretty much it. Movies are hurt by actors with too much screentime, and I daresay that it works for books too... even the most well-written characters become grating when a reader is stuck with them for too long a stretch.
There is also a sense of urgency and grandiosity that really puts me off of the whole story. I love how the movies breathlessly present Bella's options of "Edward or Jacob?" as if it will change the entire world. I will even grant that it will slightly change Bella's world, as well as Jacob's or Edward's. However, it seems that almost every other character in the whole story is caught up in this dual choice. Why?? Really, seriously, why?? Why should they care or even give it more than an iota of attention? I haven't exactly watched any of the movies repeatedly, so I really can't pick up a legitimate reason that these twenty characters are caught up in the central conceit of the story. The most ironic part is that the movie presents Bella's mother and father as absolute living (well, book-residing) proof that if you don't get your choice of soulmate right in the first try, the world does not end. For those who tell me that this IS the plot and therefore is extremely important, I would then respond by saying "QED."
For fans of the books, I'm sure that I may not have given the story enough of a chance. I may subject myself to the books at a later date, and at that point I can talk more intelligently about where the books' failures (and/or successes) take place, but the reasons above and more that remain unsaid adequately explain why I am unwilling to expend effort reading these books. I hope you understand, Twilight fans, this isn't about your judgment or lack thereof. It's about my inability to connect with a story that changes rules, presents unappealing main characters in situations I can't relate to, and doesn't provide any other more interesting struggles to overcome. No hard feelings?
Postscript: Watching Breaking Dawn, Part 1, then watching The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas the evening afterward, may have informed some of the above rant. I'm sure that it likely states quite a bit about me that I care more about analyzing Breaking Dawn rather than pondering the message contained in The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas.
I watched Breaking Dawn, Part 1 with the Rifftrax commentary over the previous weekend, purchasing the Rifftrax almost as soon as it was posted to the website. As far as a review goes, I enjoyed the Rifftrax to Breaking Dawn more than the Rifftrax for the previous three Twilight-series films. The callbacks that Mike, Kevin, and Bill referred to were good, and this movie had much more pretension to it than the previous three. I believe the pretension, and its overall grandiosity, came as a result of the decision to split the book into two parts... there really is zero subplot in the movie, so each and every plot point needs to be belabored as much as humanly possible, to tease out the storyline from about forty-five minutes of content to an hour and fifty-seven(!) minutes of content. The fact that Kristen Stewart, Robert Pattinson, and Taylor "Abduction" Lautner chew the majority of the screen throughout the film also tends to lead itself rather easily to riffs. The greatest example of the poor acting quotient is the collection of faces Kristen Stewart makes prior to her onscreen wedding... in the Rifftrax preview, it was ably skewered as a set of constipation faces. I would suggest fans to purchase this Rifftrax, especially if they have already seen movies one through three.
I wanted to dig deeper than this. So, here's the caveat: my challenge with this post is that I want to be respectful to those who like the books, especially since I am sure that many of them also support works and authors (and directors and musicians) that I also enjoy, and immersing yourself in art is always going to be beneficial. So, I'm not trying to bash or trash Stephenie Meyers or her works, just to explain why I am not the biggest fan.
To begin with, bad acting in a movie is going to turn people off from reading the book. The girl portrayed on the screen has very few redeeming qualities... to be truthful, there are two that I can possibly pinpoint... she seems as if she can be intelligent and she seems very dedicated. Of course, I can point to counterexamples of each, namely that it took forever for her to connect Edward --> vampire, and she managed to string along Jacob as a backup plan. From asking my Twilight source, in the books Bella doesn't exactly even have her looks to fall back on. The biggest and most important question I have with this series is, "Why Bella?" What makes her such a fun person to not only want to be around, but to spend large segments of your life with? On top of that, why should I, as the viewer/reader, care? This is a main character that I have zero interest in. It's not to say that books or stories are ruined with a bad main character, but a lot has to go right around the bad main character for the story to be successful. People familiar with MSTings may know the next term; Bella as portrayed on the screen is very close to the classic definition of a Mary Sue character. The only thing that possibly pulls her out of that consideration is that she's not idealized in the beginning. However, throughout the "saga", it is almost as if the author is telling us, "You HAVE to be interested in her because I am!" I may be contrarian half the time (and contrarian to being contrarian the other half), but for me to invest time and intelligence I need a corresponding return of reasons to continue investing. Why should I like her? How can I relate to her? Why should I care about her struggles? Fair warning: without answers, this leads to "So what?"
Another issue I'm nonplussed by is that they took archetypical creatures (vampires and werewolves) and completely changed the rules surrounding them. I daresay that this is just as large an issue as the Mary Sue above. In literature, cliches and stereotypes actually serve a very important role; they provide your reader with context that you don't have to busily backstory (and waste precious page space with overlong explanations) AND they also help to connect your book with the reader... "Hey, vampires, I like them!" Sharing experiences with the author helps to connect the reader.
---Quick aside: experience-sharing and filling cyphers seems to have driven the two most popular book series of the previous decade and a half. Harry Potter was not only having daring adventures, but kids could literally imagine themselves having his adventures. Same with Bella Swan, though to be frank she appeals to half of the population far easier than the other half, and the deliberate under-information as to her character makes it easier for many girls to place themselves in Bella's shoes.
Anyway, to continue the cliche examination, in Twilight, the cliches have been stood on their heads. Vampires can come out at daytime? The only reason they don't is because... they sparkle?! That takes a major limiting factor to a vampire's power and changes it from a handicap or a hurdle that must be overcome into a minor setback. Remember, why would we even care about Bella if not for her struggle, and if you take away reasons to generate struggle and conflict, that's a one-sentence explanation compared to multiple chapters of drama. Here though too, it takes something that could be a strength... a person's familiarity with a cliche, and turns it into something that will put people off. The werewolf rules got even more blurred, when their only limit to their power was having to be in either insanely-huge dog form or tearing their clothes. Full moons don't matter, nor does a werewolf's bite.
This leads into the next point. Previously-established rules are very lightly regarded in this universe. I do not know whether or not it was movie #3 or movie #4 that raised the issue of "imprinting" for werewolves... as if they were tiny ducklings(!), but it was brought to the forefront on Breaking Dawn. Jacob, after never having imprinted on Bella, imprints on the baby that comes out of Bella. They also implied in this movie that imprinting is something that is well-known and integral to a werewolf. Again, "!!!" regarding the busting of cliches above. However, that also puts the plot of movies 2 and 3 into a prism that I cared not to look at... why the holy heck did Jacob even attempt to pursue Bella romantically if he never imprinted on her? He had to know even from a young age about this "peculiarity" of "werewolves", right? Why waste all this energy on someone who not only has a boyfriend but that you also know you didn't immediately take to, and who you know you will have to relegate to a more minimal role when the imprinting happens on another person? (Yeah, yeah, "teenage angst"...) Maybe I'm reading the whole process incorrectly, but that becomes another one of the main issues with the storyline as written... if the writer can't adequately explain what's going on, that's not a failure of the reader. This is not a coded message, this is pretty central to the existence of one of the two mythical creatures the author altered from whole cloth.
Judging from the movies alone, there's very little subplot to engage your brain in other ways. Not all books need it, but it makes a very linear storyline. Subplot generates additional struggle, allows for other characters to take a brief amount of spotlight, and helps to allow tension to build in the main storyline and to give your readers a break from the otherwise unrelenting main characters. I recall one of the movies, don't remember which one, giving Jasper some backstory... and that was pretty much it. Movies are hurt by actors with too much screentime, and I daresay that it works for books too... even the most well-written characters become grating when a reader is stuck with them for too long a stretch.
There is also a sense of urgency and grandiosity that really puts me off of the whole story. I love how the movies breathlessly present Bella's options of "Edward or Jacob?" as if it will change the entire world. I will even grant that it will slightly change Bella's world, as well as Jacob's or Edward's. However, it seems that almost every other character in the whole story is caught up in this dual choice. Why?? Really, seriously, why?? Why should they care or even give it more than an iota of attention? I haven't exactly watched any of the movies repeatedly, so I really can't pick up a legitimate reason that these twenty characters are caught up in the central conceit of the story. The most ironic part is that the movie presents Bella's mother and father as absolute living (well, book-residing) proof that if you don't get your choice of soulmate right in the first try, the world does not end. For those who tell me that this IS the plot and therefore is extremely important, I would then respond by saying "QED."
For fans of the books, I'm sure that I may not have given the story enough of a chance. I may subject myself to the books at a later date, and at that point I can talk more intelligently about where the books' failures (and/or successes) take place, but the reasons above and more that remain unsaid adequately explain why I am unwilling to expend effort reading these books. I hope you understand, Twilight fans, this isn't about your judgment or lack thereof. It's about my inability to connect with a story that changes rules, presents unappealing main characters in situations I can't relate to, and doesn't provide any other more interesting struggles to overcome. No hard feelings?
Postscript: Watching Breaking Dawn, Part 1, then watching The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas the evening afterward, may have informed some of the above rant. I'm sure that it likely states quite a bit about me that I care more about analyzing Breaking Dawn rather than pondering the message contained in The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas.
24 December 2011
Happy Holidays and Movie Review: Nausicaa in the Valley of the Wind
Happy holidays everyone! I hope that everyone has a safe and enjoyable season through Christmas, the New Year, and all of the other holidays that you, your friends, and your family enjoy celebrating.
I'm glad to be able to post again for a second time in a month, and both the holiday well-wishes as well as the subject of the post (movie review!) are good excuses. You can likely tell that I'm not the tweeting type, and I need to have at least something substantive to put on the blog. I opened this blog up so many years ago for two main reasons... one was to make sure that people knew that both Megane and myself were still active and posting. The non-cynical reason was so that I could post quick-hit reviews of MSTings, movies, and other stuff that came our way (like Rifftrax and Cinematic Titanic).
Unfortunately, the world of online MSTing has all but dried up, so that leaves movie / television show / anime reviews. Again, many thanks to NetFlix for tonight's selection, the 1984 Studio Ghibli production of Nausicca in the Valley of the Wind
As quickly as the movie starts, the art is already off of the charts. The initial scene (a deserted city) is empty of people, but it is still filled... with artifacts of plants, fungi, and animals (specifically insects). Spore sacs blast pink clouds and the art gains more color, though it is still a bizarre mix of Dr. Seuss with realism, almost as if the artists were trying to figure out all of what they could get away with and still be believed.
And this is a world that will allow you to immerse yourself into it. On the outside looking in, I can see where some people may immediately fold their arms and refuse to believe in a world were the "toxic jungle" is coming to wipe out all humanity, especially if they are of the opinion that ecology (and specifically pollution) is not a major concern. The world is just different enough (and there's so little ability for the story to try to latch on to "Earth history" so to speak) that this may as well be one of the planets surrounding Alpha Centauri.
It is a longer movie, and there's quite a few messages that Studio Ghibli packed into it. The aforementioned ecology message (which seemed very similar to the one in Mononoke Hime), the pacifism of the main character who is very adamant about the lack of necessity of killing, and her very singular focus on not only trying to understand the world around her, but actually LIVING in the world around her. Nausicaa is the type of person that will adapt to any situation and immediately be not only trying to figure out how she can make herself work with it, but she would be thinking of all of the characters around her first.
I say that, and maybe this may be the start of a few posts in this subject, but the above description may sound like a Mary Sue. I truly believe that this is not the case. She does have clouded decisions, the pacifism at one point turns into a rather bad decision down the road as the rest of the world intrudes on Nausicaa's titular valley, and seems so very reckless in many cases. The selflessness would almost become overbearing, and there's probably a terrific article lurking somewhere about how Miyazaki was able to show a protagonist that had so few "flaws" but still felt... human.
While the soundtrack did dip into the 80's in a few regrettable spots, overall it was a terrific movie and very understandable why both Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli were able to build such a subsequent catalog of movies. This movie is definitely between a 3 and a 4, and I would certainly enjoy seeing it again when given the chance. There are certainly places that can be pointed out as weaknesses, but the movie is overall terrific and you'll almost find yourself not necessarily as a viewer but as an experiencer.
We'll see you again in 2012, hopefully with our completed project soon!
I'm glad to be able to post again for a second time in a month, and both the holiday well-wishes as well as the subject of the post (movie review!) are good excuses. You can likely tell that I'm not the tweeting type, and I need to have at least something substantive to put on the blog. I opened this blog up so many years ago for two main reasons... one was to make sure that people knew that both Megane and myself were still active and posting. The non-cynical reason was so that I could post quick-hit reviews of MSTings, movies, and other stuff that came our way (like Rifftrax and Cinematic Titanic).
Unfortunately, the world of online MSTing has all but dried up, so that leaves movie / television show / anime reviews. Again, many thanks to NetFlix for tonight's selection, the 1984 Studio Ghibli production of Nausicca in the Valley of the Wind
As quickly as the movie starts, the art is already off of the charts. The initial scene (a deserted city) is empty of people, but it is still filled... with artifacts of plants, fungi, and animals (specifically insects). Spore sacs blast pink clouds and the art gains more color, though it is still a bizarre mix of Dr. Seuss with realism, almost as if the artists were trying to figure out all of what they could get away with and still be believed.
And this is a world that will allow you to immerse yourself into it. On the outside looking in, I can see where some people may immediately fold their arms and refuse to believe in a world were the "toxic jungle" is coming to wipe out all humanity, especially if they are of the opinion that ecology (and specifically pollution) is not a major concern. The world is just different enough (and there's so little ability for the story to try to latch on to "Earth history" so to speak) that this may as well be one of the planets surrounding Alpha Centauri.
It is a longer movie, and there's quite a few messages that Studio Ghibli packed into it. The aforementioned ecology message (which seemed very similar to the one in Mononoke Hime), the pacifism of the main character who is very adamant about the lack of necessity of killing, and her very singular focus on not only trying to understand the world around her, but actually LIVING in the world around her. Nausicaa is the type of person that will adapt to any situation and immediately be not only trying to figure out how she can make herself work with it, but she would be thinking of all of the characters around her first.
I say that, and maybe this may be the start of a few posts in this subject, but the above description may sound like a Mary Sue. I truly believe that this is not the case. She does have clouded decisions, the pacifism at one point turns into a rather bad decision down the road as the rest of the world intrudes on Nausicaa's titular valley, and seems so very reckless in many cases. The selflessness would almost become overbearing, and there's probably a terrific article lurking somewhere about how Miyazaki was able to show a protagonist that had so few "flaws" but still felt... human.
While the soundtrack did dip into the 80's in a few regrettable spots, overall it was a terrific movie and very understandable why both Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli were able to build such a subsequent catalog of movies. This movie is definitely between a 3 and a 4, and I would certainly enjoy seeing it again when given the chance. There are certainly places that can be pointed out as weaknesses, but the movie is overall terrific and you'll almost find yourself not necessarily as a viewer but as an experiencer.
We'll see you again in 2012, hopefully with our completed project soon!
05 December 2011
Review: The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
In our latest installment of "Review the Movie Within Forty-Eight Months", we tackle The Curious Case of Benjamin Button. For those who don't already know, the movie is a whopping 166 minutes long, and it will take up an entire evening.
This, as a matter of fact, will be the first comment. The movie could have used an editor. BADLY. Yes, I do understand the hypocrisy in this statement, but I am also not a professional who charges $7.50 per viewing either. I appreciate the "show, don't tell" school of filmmaking, but I did not appreciate the time it took to set up the story in each excruciating detail, and it seemed that many scenes were rather superfluous. During one scene, the filmmakers chose to show ten minutes' worth of footage describing an accident. It took ten minutes because they not only wanted to set up all of the various little causes of the accident in detail, but they literally filmed each of these various causes and possible consequences. On top of this, the filmmakers used narration through the scene so that they could lead the audience all the way to the inescapable conclusion, though to be fair to these filmmakers they used the same narration all the way through the film.
The narration sets up the next point nicely. This movie felt like a derivative Forrest Gump in that you have the narration going on, a protagonist moving through the years and who makes sure to touch on all of the high points of the era (in this case, from World War I through about the late 60s), Southern accents that turn almost unintelligible, and the sense of groundlessness that both protagonists really seemed to share. If I wanted to see Forrest Gump again, I'd go get that. I would daresay that this movie wasn't as popular as Forrest Gump if only because there were more Baby Boomers alive in the early 90s than Greatest Generation members alive in the late 00s, but you didn't hear such cynicism from me. The same scriptwriter wrote both movies, which can certainly account for many of the similarities.
The last complaint is that the movie couldn't even keep its central message down very well. The main conceit in the movie is to have a character that is aging backwards. While Brad Pitt's face was certainly made up to appear as if he was going into different ages, I felt that the entity "Brad Pitt" was in the movie rather than seeing "Benjamin Button". In the first few scenes it was fine, but he started looking like John Denver (or maybe Philo from UHF) somewhere in the mid-1930s. After that, Brad Pitt's character seemed to jump in apparent age from about 55 or so directly to 30. When the 60s come and the plotmeat needs to be splurted into casings, it's Brad Pitt surrounded by a set from the 60s. If not for reading some of the story from Wikipedia, I would have thought that the whole movie was purely a Brad Pitt ego project rather than the filmmakers signing him to be part of their movie.
I will also admit some idiocy on my part too. The filmmakers were doing everything they could to make thunderstorms into a sort of leitmotif, but I could not divine any sort of consistent message from this leitmotif. Bad things happened during thunderstorms, good things happened during thunderstorms, I couldn't really grasp what they were trying to say. I suppose I could attempt to watch it again to really try to nail the message down, but then I'd be sitting for another 166 minutes and I'm not eager to start that again.
While researching, I read in more than a couple of places that it is a fantasy. It is not, it is pure and unadulterated love story and sentiment. Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett did what they could to generate sparks but the jarring narration and the length were just too much to overcome.
Final rating (with the scale below) --- less than a 1, I wouldn't rewatch this movie.
An extra special Bronx cheer goes out to the one-bridge-too-far, when a filmmaker wants to make a heartwarming story of togetherness and tie it to a heartrending story of love and loss, yet names the main character "Button" and have his family run a button factory which goes by the name "Button's Buttons". Really, movie? If you're going to turn the original short story into something COMPLETELY different, make sure your details at least try to match the new somber mood.
SEE IT IF:
* You love Brad Pitt
* You love hearing Brad Pitt's voice narrating stuff
* You want to relive your youth in 1920's and Depression-era United States (or remember being roughly 20 years old in the 60s)
* You're interested in seeing what Oscar voters see
DON'T SEE IT IF:
* You can't make out simultaneous Southern Accent and Old Person Mumble and it bugs you pretty badly (Cate Blanchett, I'm looking at YOU.)
* You'd rather get schmaltzy about age by spending seven extra minutes watching Toy Story AND Toy Story 2 back-to-back.
* You have any other plans this evening.
* You want to understand why Oscar voters vote the way they do.
* You want to make a Rifftrax (seriously, too long and bloated, unless you're an awesome writer)
Don't miss these POINTS OF INTEREST:
* Cap'n Mike the artist
* The lightning dude
* Trying to figure out why the hell an American tugboat is being based out of Murmansk in the runup to World War II.
This, as a matter of fact, will be the first comment. The movie could have used an editor. BADLY. Yes, I do understand the hypocrisy in this statement, but I am also not a professional who charges $7.50 per viewing either. I appreciate the "show, don't tell" school of filmmaking, but I did not appreciate the time it took to set up the story in each excruciating detail, and it seemed that many scenes were rather superfluous. During one scene, the filmmakers chose to show ten minutes' worth of footage describing an accident. It took ten minutes because they not only wanted to set up all of the various little causes of the accident in detail, but they literally filmed each of these various causes and possible consequences. On top of this, the filmmakers used narration through the scene so that they could lead the audience all the way to the inescapable conclusion, though to be fair to these filmmakers they used the same narration all the way through the film.
The narration sets up the next point nicely. This movie felt like a derivative Forrest Gump in that you have the narration going on, a protagonist moving through the years and who makes sure to touch on all of the high points of the era (in this case, from World War I through about the late 60s), Southern accents that turn almost unintelligible, and the sense of groundlessness that both protagonists really seemed to share. If I wanted to see Forrest Gump again, I'd go get that. I would daresay that this movie wasn't as popular as Forrest Gump if only because there were more Baby Boomers alive in the early 90s than Greatest Generation members alive in the late 00s, but you didn't hear such cynicism from me. The same scriptwriter wrote both movies, which can certainly account for many of the similarities.
The last complaint is that the movie couldn't even keep its central message down very well. The main conceit in the movie is to have a character that is aging backwards. While Brad Pitt's face was certainly made up to appear as if he was going into different ages, I felt that the entity "Brad Pitt" was in the movie rather than seeing "Benjamin Button". In the first few scenes it was fine, but he started looking like John Denver (or maybe Philo from UHF) somewhere in the mid-1930s. After that, Brad Pitt's character seemed to jump in apparent age from about 55 or so directly to 30. When the 60s come and the plotmeat needs to be splurted into casings, it's Brad Pitt surrounded by a set from the 60s. If not for reading some of the story from Wikipedia, I would have thought that the whole movie was purely a Brad Pitt ego project rather than the filmmakers signing him to be part of their movie.
I will also admit some idiocy on my part too. The filmmakers were doing everything they could to make thunderstorms into a sort of leitmotif, but I could not divine any sort of consistent message from this leitmotif. Bad things happened during thunderstorms, good things happened during thunderstorms, I couldn't really grasp what they were trying to say. I suppose I could attempt to watch it again to really try to nail the message down, but then I'd be sitting for another 166 minutes and I'm not eager to start that again.
While researching, I read in more than a couple of places that it is a fantasy. It is not, it is pure and unadulterated love story and sentiment. Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett did what they could to generate sparks but the jarring narration and the length were just too much to overcome.
Final rating (with the scale below) --- less than a 1, I wouldn't rewatch this movie.
An extra special Bronx cheer goes out to the one-bridge-too-far, when a filmmaker wants to make a heartwarming story of togetherness and tie it to a heartrending story of love and loss, yet names the main character "Button" and have his family run a button factory which goes by the name "Button's Buttons". Really, movie? If you're going to turn the original short story into something COMPLETELY different, make sure your details at least try to match the new somber mood.
SEE IT IF:
* You love Brad Pitt
* You love hearing Brad Pitt's voice narrating stuff
* You want to relive your youth in 1920's and Depression-era United States (or remember being roughly 20 years old in the 60s)
* You're interested in seeing what Oscar voters see
DON'T SEE IT IF:
* You can't make out simultaneous Southern Accent and Old Person Mumble and it bugs you pretty badly (Cate Blanchett, I'm looking at YOU.)
* You'd rather get schmaltzy about age by spending seven extra minutes watching Toy Story AND Toy Story 2 back-to-back.
* You have any other plans this evening.
* You want to understand why Oscar voters vote the way they do.
* You want to make a Rifftrax (seriously, too long and bloated, unless you're an awesome writer)
Don't miss these POINTS OF INTEREST:
* Cap'n Mike the artist
* The lightning dude
* Trying to figure out why the hell an American tugboat is being based out of Murmansk in the runup to World War II.
16 November 2011
Protect IP Act / Stop Online Piracy Act and its ramifications:
Hello again everyone,
It's been almost forever since I've posted, though there's definitely something stuck in my craw tonight. While I've been following net neutrality at a distance lately, there's something far more insidious... and that's the Motion Picture Association of America, the Recording Industry Association of America, and Microsoft banding together to make laws for the United States.
You see, there's a problem they're having. They can't get anyone to buy their overpriced crap. Unfortunately, the Internet is a good place to share the fact that what they've got is crap, and while there are people who do share their crap online (gasp, even in the U.S.!) they still wouldn't be caught dead wanting to buy it.
Instead of facing facts and realizing that these people wouldn't buy their crap at any price other than free, they THINK that these people are just a market to be tapped and that once piracy is "stamped out", they will have increased sales.
The only problem? They're now using the U.S. Government to try to enforce ALL piracy (including overseas piracy) AND they're telling all of the Internet companies that M$, RIAA, and MPAA are not paying for this new and fascinating service. They're throwing it all on the communications companies (and to some extent, credit card providers by blocking sales) to police this. And the best part is that the U.S. Government is rolling so far backwards for this as to make any CLAIM enforceable rather than forcing these idiots to actually come before a court to defend themselves.
I call this bad news because ultimately what we do on this website is operate in the grey area of copyright, ostensibly to fight against crap. Of course, there are arguments that what my cowriter and I do is to make fun of stories written by people who are practicing, or who may have a good topic but not-so-great execution, and I agree. However, in order to make the jokes we do, we draw similarities to many aspects of life, including movies published by companies represented by the MPAA, or music published by companies represented by the RIAA, or... well, Microsoft. We do this to also poke fun at deserving representatives of bad music or movies (among other things). We are not making a thin dime off of any of this, but I really do not know what might happen if the webmaster currently running nabiki.com would ever receive one of these claim letters. Point being, I do fear for the future of both the online marketplace of ideas as well as the ability of this site (or many others) to continue, especially if copyrights become SO IMPORTANT that they can triumph over both free speech and the rights to a trial of your peers.
To be truthful, I do fear somewhat for the larger world of fanfiction too. I have no clue if sites like FFnet or Mediaminer would also be shut down, because there are a lot of copyrighted characters all over the place there, and those websites are run partially by advertisements (if I remember correctly). This is a serious issue, and there is a lot of money being poured in by our esteemed "corporate citizens" in order to ensure passage. (It's really amazing that our corporate citizens seem to have far more rights than, say, real citizens.)
Feel free to write your congressman and senator, the Protect IP Act is Senate Bill S968 and the Stop Online Piracy Act is HR3261. It's pretty sad in that this bill was voted down in 2010 as the "Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeiting Act", but BIG money talks and buys our lawmakers.
Whether or not they get it through this time, they'll keep trying. The very second they do, I will be happy to participate in ANY boycott that is organized, be it movie sharing/swapping with friends or the library, and my already barely existent buying of both music and Microsoft products will come to a very quick end.
Fight the power!
---Zoogz
It's been almost forever since I've posted, though there's definitely something stuck in my craw tonight. While I've been following net neutrality at a distance lately, there's something far more insidious... and that's the Motion Picture Association of America, the Recording Industry Association of America, and Microsoft banding together to make laws for the United States.
You see, there's a problem they're having. They can't get anyone to buy their overpriced crap. Unfortunately, the Internet is a good place to share the fact that what they've got is crap, and while there are people who do share their crap online (gasp, even in the U.S.!) they still wouldn't be caught dead wanting to buy it.
Instead of facing facts and realizing that these people wouldn't buy their crap at any price other than free, they THINK that these people are just a market to be tapped and that once piracy is "stamped out", they will have increased sales.
The only problem? They're now using the U.S. Government to try to enforce ALL piracy (including overseas piracy) AND they're telling all of the Internet companies that M$, RIAA, and MPAA are not paying for this new and fascinating service. They're throwing it all on the communications companies (and to some extent, credit card providers by blocking sales) to police this. And the best part is that the U.S. Government is rolling so far backwards for this as to make any CLAIM enforceable rather than forcing these idiots to actually come before a court to defend themselves.
I call this bad news because ultimately what we do on this website is operate in the grey area of copyright, ostensibly to fight against crap. Of course, there are arguments that what my cowriter and I do is to make fun of stories written by people who are practicing, or who may have a good topic but not-so-great execution, and I agree. However, in order to make the jokes we do, we draw similarities to many aspects of life, including movies published by companies represented by the MPAA, or music published by companies represented by the RIAA, or... well, Microsoft. We do this to also poke fun at deserving representatives of bad music or movies (among other things). We are not making a thin dime off of any of this, but I really do not know what might happen if the webmaster currently running nabiki.com would ever receive one of these claim letters. Point being, I do fear for the future of both the online marketplace of ideas as well as the ability of this site (or many others) to continue, especially if copyrights become SO IMPORTANT that they can triumph over both free speech and the rights to a trial of your peers.
To be truthful, I do fear somewhat for the larger world of fanfiction too. I have no clue if sites like FFnet or Mediaminer would also be shut down, because there are a lot of copyrighted characters all over the place there, and those websites are run partially by advertisements (if I remember correctly). This is a serious issue, and there is a lot of money being poured in by our esteemed "corporate citizens" in order to ensure passage. (It's really amazing that our corporate citizens seem to have far more rights than, say, real citizens.)
Feel free to write your congressman and senator, the Protect IP Act is Senate Bill S968 and the Stop Online Piracy Act is HR3261. It's pretty sad in that this bill was voted down in 2010 as the "Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeiting Act", but BIG money talks and buys our lawmakers.
Whether or not they get it through this time, they'll keep trying. The very second they do, I will be happy to participate in ANY boycott that is organized, be it movie sharing/swapping with friends or the library, and my already barely existent buying of both music and Microsoft products will come to a very quick end.
Fight the power!
---Zoogz
10 September 2011
Quick and Dirty Rifftrax Reviews updated!
Megane 6.7 has added another recent batch of reviews to the original "Quick and Dirty Rifftrax Review" post. It can be found at http://mstings.blogspot.com/2007/03/really-quick-n-dirty-rifftrax-reviews.html, or on the link at the right. Happy Rifftraxing!
Movie review -- Where the Wild Things Are and The Gruffalo
I know... it's been forever. And I post about movies that are months old to boot. I figure, some content is better than none, and I actually have a hook behind publishing for a change.
Recently, my family watched the two films in the title in a sort of all-day movie marathon. I am taken by both the similarities of both movies as well as the differences and the choices. I will lay them all out below:
1) Where the Wild Things Are -- 2009
Budget: $100 Million
Type: Live-action
Length: 100 minutes
I've read more than a few reviews of this movie. Many of the reviews said that this was a movie more for grownups, though we let our elementary-school children watch this movie. I can see why they say that. The book has terrific art yet a somewhat uncomfortable story of a boy who is very rambunctious and gets in trouble. In the book, it is his imagination that takes him to where the Wild Things are... in the movie, it's not quite that clear. The movie is a bit dark... when you animate Wild Things though, they have to have some sort of danger attached or they wouldn't be very wild. The Wild Things are very much reflections of Max's inner moods and demons. The movie itself gets very uncomfortable quite often.
The reviewers praised the movie, saying that it was a ride through childhood and reflects that childhood isn't the prosaic existence that many people may remember. I know my childhood was certainly rocky at times too, but the level of conflict and unevenness really is off-putting. My children did not like the movie, and I can agree with them. The biggest draw in the book is the art for me... and while the Jim Henson Creature Shop did the best they could, it just couldn't match the lushness of Sendak's art in the book.
This is a movie that I was happy to watch, but only once. I will implement a new review system here to kind of show my level of interest in movies, a one-to-four scale with a bit of blur in the middle steps...
1.I wouldn't watch it even if it was halfway through on TV.
2.I would watch it if it was on, but not intentionally cue it up.
3.I would get the tape and watch it occasionally
4.I would get the tape and watch it often.
(Please note that if a movie has a Rifftrax associated with it, I will give two ratings, one for the movie itself and one for the movie+Rifftrax.)
With that said, this movie was a definite 1. It's the definition of a 1, in that I would at least suggest that others watch it exactly once just to see if it's their bag, but it certainly isn't mine.
So, with that said, on to the second movie!
2)The Gruffalo -- 2009
Budget: possibly $3 million?
Type: Animated
Length: 30 minutes
This was the second movie of the set, and it was also based on a children's book with an unreal character. I suppose you can call me partial to animation, but I honestly felt more involved in this production than in Where the Wild Things Are. The art was very engaging and interesting, and even as the little mouse spun his tales of the fantastic Gruffalo I was not put off as much as when Max was promoting dirt-clod fights by throwing the clods into Things' heads. The Gruffalo was ugly but humorous, and the voices were terrific. To be truthful, the voices were probably two-thirds of the budget, but I still enjoyed the animation.
Additionally, the length of time was just good enough to capture little attention spans. My children definitely enjoyed this movie over the previous one.
My rating would be a solid 2.5 to 3. I would absolutely sit down to watch it, and as it's half-an-hour, I would not mind watching it with my children again.
I wrote this post though to compare and contrast a bit though. One is a massive Hollywood production and a bit of a vanity project for director Spike Jonze (and even a bit for producer Tom Hanks). The other is a BBC One television production. One had a script vastly expanded from the source material, and one was fairly faithful. One was moved into live-action and had painstaking work done to make the creatures come alive... and the other had creatures come alive through the non-reality of animation.
Ultimately, I wish Hollywood would do more to focus on making stories more honest, straightforward, and enjoyable to the children that they are trying to tell stories to. It is very incongruous to make a movie out of a children's book and tell everyone that it's only for adults, and while I see many of the critic's comments about the struggle of childhood and the monsters in our own moods, it doesn't make it enjoyable. I used to harp on audience many times back in the days when MSTing authors would present MSTings for C&C, and I wish that Hollywood would take this into consideration more often too.
Recently, my family watched the two films in the title in a sort of all-day movie marathon. I am taken by both the similarities of both movies as well as the differences and the choices. I will lay them all out below:
1) Where the Wild Things Are -- 2009
Budget: $100 Million
Type: Live-action
Length: 100 minutes
I've read more than a few reviews of this movie. Many of the reviews said that this was a movie more for grownups, though we let our elementary-school children watch this movie. I can see why they say that. The book has terrific art yet a somewhat uncomfortable story of a boy who is very rambunctious and gets in trouble. In the book, it is his imagination that takes him to where the Wild Things are... in the movie, it's not quite that clear. The movie is a bit dark... when you animate Wild Things though, they have to have some sort of danger attached or they wouldn't be very wild. The Wild Things are very much reflections of Max's inner moods and demons. The movie itself gets very uncomfortable quite often.
The reviewers praised the movie, saying that it was a ride through childhood and reflects that childhood isn't the prosaic existence that many people may remember. I know my childhood was certainly rocky at times too, but the level of conflict and unevenness really is off-putting. My children did not like the movie, and I can agree with them. The biggest draw in the book is the art for me... and while the Jim Henson Creature Shop did the best they could, it just couldn't match the lushness of Sendak's art in the book.
This is a movie that I was happy to watch, but only once. I will implement a new review system here to kind of show my level of interest in movies, a one-to-four scale with a bit of blur in the middle steps...
1.I wouldn't watch it even if it was halfway through on TV.
2.I would watch it if it was on, but not intentionally cue it up.
3.I would get the tape and watch it occasionally
4.I would get the tape and watch it often.
(Please note that if a movie has a Rifftrax associated with it, I will give two ratings, one for the movie itself and one for the movie+Rifftrax.)
With that said, this movie was a definite 1. It's the definition of a 1, in that I would at least suggest that others watch it exactly once just to see if it's their bag, but it certainly isn't mine.
So, with that said, on to the second movie!
2)The Gruffalo -- 2009
Budget: possibly $3 million?
Type: Animated
Length: 30 minutes
This was the second movie of the set, and it was also based on a children's book with an unreal character. I suppose you can call me partial to animation, but I honestly felt more involved in this production than in Where the Wild Things Are. The art was very engaging and interesting, and even as the little mouse spun his tales of the fantastic Gruffalo I was not put off as much as when Max was promoting dirt-clod fights by throwing the clods into Things' heads. The Gruffalo was ugly but humorous, and the voices were terrific. To be truthful, the voices were probably two-thirds of the budget, but I still enjoyed the animation.
Additionally, the length of time was just good enough to capture little attention spans. My children definitely enjoyed this movie over the previous one.
My rating would be a solid 2.5 to 3. I would absolutely sit down to watch it, and as it's half-an-hour, I would not mind watching it with my children again.
I wrote this post though to compare and contrast a bit though. One is a massive Hollywood production and a bit of a vanity project for director Spike Jonze (and even a bit for producer Tom Hanks). The other is a BBC One television production. One had a script vastly expanded from the source material, and one was fairly faithful. One was moved into live-action and had painstaking work done to make the creatures come alive... and the other had creatures come alive through the non-reality of animation.
Ultimately, I wish Hollywood would do more to focus on making stories more honest, straightforward, and enjoyable to the children that they are trying to tell stories to. It is very incongruous to make a movie out of a children's book and tell everyone that it's only for adults, and while I see many of the critic's comments about the struggle of childhood and the monsters in our own moods, it doesn't make it enjoyable. I used to harp on audience many times back in the days when MSTing authors would present MSTings for C&C, and I wish that Hollywood would take this into consideration more often too.
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