Lion-kun's Critique Zone

Star Trek: Into Darkness i.e Because removing the article makes it sound cooler

Sat, 18 May 2013 08:00:53 -0400

I’m not a Trekkie. Only Star Trek thing I’ve watched besides the first film of the J.J reboot is Wrath of Khan. I say this to make it clear that I’m not just some fanboy whose hurt that the movie mixed up a name or got the design of the enterprise slightly wrong. My opinion of the film will mostly be based on how it fares on its own. My opinion? It was a piece of shit.

I admit I wasn’t going in with high expectations. I did not like the first one ( I don’t like J.J Abrams aka Mr. Lens Flare as a whole), I thought it had stupid characters, poor writing, a horrible villain and just this unpleasant feel of being manufactured just to pander to brainless audiences that I did not like. And I heard this new one was written by Damon Lindelof aka that horrible writer who wrote Prometheus that keeps getting work because he cowrote Lost. But man, was this movie bad.

A lot of people will defend it as “It’s just a blockbuster film, quit thinking about it so hard, just turn your brain off!” You know, those people who use the same argument with films like Transformers or Phantom Menace. Well there’s turning your brain off and there’s lobotomizing yourself. Even for popcorn films, there are standards. And oh boy, did this film not meet them.

The writing is bad…like really bad. The kind you just can’t ignore because of how much it stands out in its awfulness. Not even the kind that you pick apart after you watch the film, the kind that sticks out while you’re watching the movie. Just nothing makes sense in this movie…at all. It’s just incredible how nonsensical the entire plot is. It’s one thing to have blockbusters like say in Iron Man where you have plotholes and plotthreads that lead nowhere. But you know, at least the film is structured and paced well and you have a clear sense of where the film is going with the story. It’s just amazing to me how this film could be so simple and yet so overly complicated at the same time.

From the opening scene, we get action scene. Not even some sort of transition into it, literally first scene, Kirk and Bones running from angry natives. We’re thrust into some mission to stop a volcano from exploding and destroying a random planet by detonating an ice bomb in the centre of the eruption. Without being given any sort of ground that we as the audience can stand on, no clear idea of what’s going on, what’s at stake, how we got to this point, sure it’s all explained later but we lack any sort of emotional investment into the action scene, it’s just pretty lights. And it just made no sense. So Kirk was given a mission t survey the planet but he decided to defy the prime directive and interfere with the planet’s destiny by saving it. So he and Bones go steal some scroll from the natives…for some reason (I guess just to start the movie with a chase scene) while Spock takes an ice bomb into the centre of the volcano to detonate it. Why they couldn’t have just threw the bomb in there instead of sending their science officer inside to plant it, I don’t know. And when Kirk goes to save Spock from the explosion, Spock tells him no because it would break the rules of the Prime Directive to let the natives (a very primitive race who hadn’t even invented the wheel yet) see them. Even though Spock wouldn’t have been in that situation if he hadn’t willingly broken far bigger rules of the Prime Directive in the first place. And of course there’s no emotional investment in the scene because it’s the opening scene so you know Kirk is just going to ignore him and save him anyway. Which he did. And then to thank him for saving his life, Spock files a report on the mission that makes Kirk lose his captain position. This is the opening scene of the movie. It gets worse from here.

The premise itself is pretty simple on the surface. Kirk is given a covert operation to kill a terrorist, a genetically engineered super being, who blew up an important government facility and assassinated several high ranking government members including a long time father figure to Kirk. The terrorist is hiding himself in Klingon territory (how he teleported from Earth to a different quadrant of the galaxy is beyond me) so there is some sensitive diplomatic issues as one wrong move could incite the Klingons to go to war with earth. Okay, interesting enough premise, it could work. How it turned into some convoluted plot about smuggling people in photon torpedoes outfitted with cryogenic chambers is beyond me. The plot is just so nonsensical and absurd. the Klingons show up pretty quickly in the movie and then just drop out just as quickly and are never heard of again. We find out that the Admiral that gave the Kirk the mission to kill the terrorist is secretly trying to incite war with the Klingons by having them blow up the terrorist on a planet in Klingon territory with the nukes filled with frozen people that aforementioned terrorist had somehow put them inside and the Admiral never noticed. We have the Admiral’s plans and the terrorist’s plans being thrown around in some convoluted plot but honestly all these plot threads were just a shallow excuse to shoehorn in more action scenes opposed to trying to the action being used to tell the story. The movie is just so transparent in the way its fumbling around to give us mroe action scenes. Action scenes are fun and entertaining but they cannot be all that is to the movie. The action scenes were mostly good (though a few just fell flat on their face), I won’t deny that but the movie just lacked any sort of substance. It was all flash, pretty lights to impress the audience, a team of CGI designers masturbating onto the silver screen. That’s all it amounted to. There was just no real story and it’s just incredible to me how much it feels like the producers didn’t care about putting in a story.

The movie is trying REALLY hard in this to be dramatic and dark. To its detriment. Whereas the first one, although I didn’t like it, had a fun factor I could appreciate. This one was just constant angst and forced drama. Likable characters having constant bitch cat fights with each other. Literally the first act of this movie was bitch fight, action scene, bitch fight, action scene, lather, rinse, repeat. The actors themselves are pretty great but the characters they were given to work with could not be saved. I love Simon Pegg, he was funny in this movie and damn near stole the whole show yet I didn’t laugh once at his jokes even though they’re legitimately funny because the combination of bad writing and angsty drama took me that much out of the movie. This is more true than most with the terrorist played by Benedict Cumberbatch…which gets to one of my biggest gripes with the film.

So big spoilers alert. The terrorist is Khan. Khan is a major big deal in the Trek universe. Even non-Trekkies recognize him as a very, very big villain. When you use Khan in your movie, you’re living up to a very, very high standard because Khan is one of the most interesting, complex. well-written characters in not only the show but in the history of media. Yes, those are very big words and I mean them, he is that iconic and great a character. And of course, they fuck him up. All credit to Benedict Cumberbatch, he is a great actor, he was really giving it his absolute best in his performance, but the character he was given was just so cliche. I guess he was a better villain than the first one, sort of, though that was a very low bar to raise. I was actually interested in his character at first, there was something so seething and menacing about his performance hinting at more complexity to the character. I was also interested at how they were depicting him in a more anti-hero like role making me think they were going to do something really ballsy and have Khan be on the side of the good guys. But nope, all that was just thrown away. He kills the Admiral and then goes on a monologue on how he is the superior race and he will rule the galaxy or what not, yadda yadda. Generic, boring villain stuff. And then they had him snarl a lot when he did his betrayal sthick. It was like a parody at that point. When you compare to the complexity of the original khan, it’s just an insult.

And then there’s the issue of race which I have to bring up because apart from being a valid argument, it personally pisses me off too. Gene Rodenberry, the original creator of Star Trek said that if you combined all the genes of humanity into a perfect being, he would not be a white guy. That’s the reason the original khan was played by a Hispanic. Gene Rodenberry, in the 60’s was fighting for racial equality by including a multiracial cast, something that was never before seen on television. And here in 2013, we’re casting a white guy to play Khan. It’s whitewashing, pure and simple. I don’t want to her shit like how Benedict was the perfect guy for the job. This is supposed to be alternative universe Khan. Studios cast him because they didn’t think white audiences would sit well with a non-white villain.It’s racism, pure and simple.

That J.J Abrams couldn’t respect the original wishes of the creator of the franchise goes to show just how much he cares about the spirit of the show. Anyone with such a lack of respect for the source material has absolutely no right using Khan. This is a problem I had with the first film. Now I said I wasn’t a Trekkie, but Star Trek is such an influential show that is absolutely engrained in our popcultural subconscious to the point that we all know the tone of the series. It was supposed to be a more intelligent, philosophical show that explored many interesting sci-fi elements in a smart way as well as the human condition. And J.J. Abrams turned the franchise into action movies. Now I am aware that the franchise has had many spin-offs that missed the point of the series and tried to actionify it up but not to the shameless extent of J.J Abrams in my opinion. The man has absolutely no respect for Star Trek, he even admitted as much in interviews how he never got the show as a kid when all his friends were talking about it and how he found it boring (but he quickly said after that he loves it now though, uh huh). J.J. Abrams is just exploiting Star Trek, taking it, remanufacturing it into something that completely betrays the original spirit of the show, all for the sake of mass marketing it into something more palatable for the dumb audiences (and I’m no saying you’re dumb for liking it, I’m saying it’s being remade to be as simple and unchallenging as possible). I think the whole issue is aptly described with this metaphor written on this link

http://raktajino-hot.tumblr.com/post/50460496375/baking-with-jj-abrams

(all credit goes to the writer of the post)

Me personally, I’ll clarify my distaste of his exploitation by describing THAT scene. My god, that scene. I have never, ever been so angry at a movie. I was throwing my popcorn at the screen by that point, I never knew a movie could actually drive a person to do that, I thought it was the stuff of fiction. That scene…

Spoilers of spoilers, they remake Spock’s death frame for frame except they do it in reverse with Kirk being the one dying. They had the temerity to do that…Ripping off Wrath of Khan is one thing, hell the first movie was pretty much a rip off of Wrath of Khan story wise, even Star Trek nemesis. But for them to be so shameless to do it scene for scene right down to damn near identical dialogue and the scene of the two of them touching hands through the glass? I dare anyone who says this is a love letter to the franchise to see that scene and tell me it’s not just simple exploitation. I’m not a Trekkie, I only saw that one movie and I am offended, let alone how a dedicated fan must feel. Because Wrath of Khan, on its own is a fantastic movie with one of the most heart-wrenching scenes in cinema and they rip it off scene for scene. But wait, it gets WORSE. Because you’re probably thinking to yourselves, wait, they killed Kirk. He’s the main character. Well you’re exactly right. Because right after they shamelessly rip off one of the most beautiful death scenes in cinema, they shamelessly revive him with a obscenely telegraphed plot point with Khan’s cells being able to revive a Tribble.They just shamelessly rip off one of the best death scenes ever made and just completely invalidate it. I was disgusted by the movie at that point. Oh and cherry on the cake, they make Spock scream Khaaaaaaan after Kirk died…Just fuck this movie. I’m not a Trekkie but I respect the show and its influence and what it was trying to accomplish. J.J. Abrams and his crack team of writers and producers clearly did not.

I guess if you just want some pretty action sequences, the movie delivers. By all means watch the movie if you want. I’m not being condescending, it has great acting and visual effects, some good comedy. But for me personally, the writing was so bad, the manufactured just to get a profit feeling the first one game me was so prevalent, the characters were so unlikable, the action scenes felt so much like the point of the movie rather than a way to tell the story and the feeling of exploitation of such an influential show stuck out so much for me, too much for me, way too much. For me, this movie gives sci-fi movies a bad name, it gives Blockbusters a bad name and it gives Star Trek a bad name. Just no.

Baking with JJ Abrams

Wed, 15 May 2013 00:24:40 -0400

Person: JJ, I want you to make some chocolate chip cookies.

JJ: [Returns several hours later with an apple pie mashed into a cookie box]

Person: … this is an apple pie mashed into a cookie box.

JJ: No, it’s chocolate chip cookies. Made for people like me, who hate chocolate!

Read More

Star Trek Into Darkness, and why I'm not

Mon, 13 May 2013 14:36:14 -0400

airspaniel:

If people are staying spoiler-free, that’s fine, and I won’t harsh your buzz. However, I will not be seeing the movie in theaters, I will not be giving it any of my money, and I am not particularly interested in discussing it.

That said, I’m gonna discuss it.

Read More

avengers skit on Saturday Night Live starring Jeremy Renner

Sun, 12 May 2013 03:35:52 -0400

avengers skit on Saturday Night Live starring Jeremy Renner

tacgnol: paralysedbeaver: Shaun of the Dead (2003), Hot Fuzz...

Thu, 09 May 2013 14:32:41 -0400

tacgnol:

paralysedbeaver:

Shaun of the Dead (2003), Hot Fuzz (2007), The World’s End (2013) [x,x,x]

I’m so happy someone already made this photoset

Iron Man 3 i.e this is what sex feels like!

Wed, 01 May 2013 03:55:21 -0400

Iron Man 3: You know that feeling when you’re really hyped up for a movie and then it ends up not as being good as you thought it’d be? It wasn’t bad per se. Just didn’t meet your really high expectations. We call that hype disillusionment and it really sucks when tat happens because you’re spoiling your experience of a perfectly good movie. Well, it didn’t fucking happen here because this movie was amazing.

Best Marvel movie next to Avengers, hands down. I was actually surprised at the number of people who said that it wasn’t as good as the first one. I thought it was way better than the first one. Grander scale, funnier jokes, fantastic action choreography, a climax to die for. Yes, story-wise there seemed to be some flaws here and there but fuck it if I care, that was a fantastic ride.

My biggest fear going into this movie was that it was going to be Dark Knight with Robert Downey Jr. The film seemed to have had a darker tone given the trailers and I was worried it’ll go against the spirit of the franchise just to cash in with the Nolan lovers. Fortunately, that was definitely not the case here. It was darker than the other two sure (there were some really grisly deaths in this one) but it was still Iron Man, it was still the wise-cracking, snarky Robert Downey Jr. that we love. And some of the jokes in this movie were just gut bustingly funny especially a certain twist that I won’t spoil that was practically the punchline of the movie. Although, since we’re talking about comedy, I must admit there were a couple of jokes that may have been dragged out a tad too much.

Again, the action choreography was just phenomenal. I have always loved what the marvel movies do with action scenes because they do such a fantastic job translating comic book style action scenes into real life without it feeling out of place. It’s well directed, easy to follow and very clever.

The directing of the film was very well done, great camera work, really dynamic with some great angles at key scenes. The shots of people in the sky were really well done, you really got a sense of a vastness of the sky and what people were going through falling 20,000 feet, I was actually pretty uncomfortable during that scene, it was very vertigo-inducing.

Story-wise, though there were some glaring plotholes here and there and some far-fetched story twists, the movie was very well done especially regarding the characterization. The movie was much more personal than the other two exploring Tony’s inner demons making for an interesting exploration of Tony’s character. The villain was good, threatening, entertaining (and surprisingly very snarky but not in a way that we couldn’t take him seriously), I wish I could talk more about him but that’d be spoiling the best twist in the movie.There were also some really well done side-characters. Pepper was great, a great example of a female character done right. There was also an awesome kid that has to be one of the best done kids I’ve ever seen in a movie. He wasn’t obnoxious, he didn’t get in the way but was actually very useful and was very funny (in fact he had one of the funniest scenes in the film)

The climax of the movie, again, was just to die for. When I saw all those multiple suits in the trailer, I thought, wouldn’t be awesome like if he switches between suits in battle to suit different purposes? Well that’s what happened and it’s only a small part of the awesome stuff that happened in that climax.

What else can I say? If you’re a lover of the Marvel Movie franchise, this movie is your wet dream. Watch as soon as possible!

Oblivion i.e. The new Tom Cruise Sci-Fi flick

Tue, 30 Apr 2013 04:42:40 -0400

Oblivion: I love Sci-fi movies when they’re done right. They allow for interesting explorations for complex ethical issues and can give some of the most fascinating worlds moreso than even fantasy movies because these worlds would have more grounded and scientific explanations to support them making them more interesting, intricate and well thought out opposed to MAGIC. Unfortunately, there seems to be a bias towards Sci-fi films in today’s audiences, they’re not as marketable so studios avoid making them as risky ventures. most sci-films made aren’t really sci-fi but more action or horror films with sci-fi elements. I love Iron Man as a movie but it’s not really a sci-fi film as much as an action film with sci-fi elements. Same with Star Wars, I like the original trilogy as a whole (not the prequels obviously) but they’re not really sci-fi movies in the same vein Star Trek was, they’re more action movies just set in a more futuristic world. Certainly not the kind of sci-fi films I really love that explores complex ethical or political issues, where the story is propagated by events logically tied into the world built up in the story. In most sci-fi films, the world is just a gimmick to throw some crazy elaborate obstacle for the hero to overcome, glorified action movies. Not to say sci-fi movies shouldn’t have action, but if you’re going to have action, there should be a balance between that and exploring the scientific aspects of the show

Here are a list of good sci-fi movies that I personally just really love: Back to the Future, District 9, Alien and Aliens, Total recall (the original), 12 Monkeys, Matrix 1 and 2, Looper, Star Trek: Wrath of Khan, Terminator 1 and 2, Blade Runner, Dredd (the new one not the Stallone version), 2001: A Space Odyssey, Minority Report.

All with varying degrees of action to sci-fi ratios but all entertaining movies that explore the world they set up to some extent.

Now for fun, bad sci-fi movies: Prometheus, Total Recall (the reboot), Star Trek (the reboot), Battlefield Earth, I Robot, War of the Worlds (The Tom Cruise version), Avatar, Matrix 3, Southland Tales, Planet of the Apes (the Tim Burton reboot), Independence Day.

Now with that said, where does this new movie Oblivion fall under in my lists? Good movie. Very good movie in fact.

What I really liked about Oblivion is that it falls under one of those sci-fi movies that goes through great pains to set up and explore the world it creates, explores some interesting concepts and issues, balances the action scenes with scenes of exploration of the world it created, has quiet moments where Tom Cruise is just relaxing and listening to some records in one of the last forests still left in the world.

The story starts in post apocalyptic earth where the moon was destroyed by a race known as Scavengers and where a giant war had taken place between humans and the Scavengers where the humans won but the planet was ruined in the process. Humans have migrated to a moon in Saturn’s orbit while Tom Cruise and his companion are tasked to maintain drones that act as a security system against any surviving Scavengers while a terraforming process is going on in order to try and restore the Earth. Already, we have a very interesting premise, explained in the first five minutes of the movie in a clear and well-explained manner. This is how the movie started however as it progressed, there are story twists that completely change your perception of this world. However they’re done well, it’s a very logical progression built on things already explained by the movie and made sense in the context of what we already knew. This a sign of a good sci-fi movie opposed to those bad ones that would just give badly paced exposition that would drag down the movie.

Not to say that the story of this movie was perfect. Oh far from it, it had its fair share of plot holes, you could easily spend a lot of time to pick apart this movie with all its flaws and inconsistencies. But this is par for the course for any sci-fi movie. However at least there is a story based on this world, it’s not just a set piece for elaborate action scenes, there was an effort to write this story and a good one overall with a clear direction and that explored interesting issues regarding memories and what is a human soul and how do you react when everything you know about your world is a lie. Which is more than can be said for shitty sci-fi flicks like Prometheus which was just a pretentious creature feature flick or the Star Trek: Reboot which was just a more soulless version of Star Wars (so I guess kinda like the prequels). I was interested and engaged in this world and the writers did a good job writing a story that was dictated by the world they set up rather than a story that was completely irrelevant of it.

Visually, this movie was stunning. One of the most beautiful movies I’ve ever seen. Avatar, I was never a fan of the visuals because it always came off so cartoonish to me especially with its giant blue cat people. This movie’s cinematography was just stunning. The things it did with clouds was just gorgeous. The action scenes were also well choreographed, cleverly written and gorgeously presented.

Acting was great all around. Tom Cruise was his awesome, intense self. Morgan Freeman gave one of his most interesting and entertaining performances to date.

The music in this film was amazing. The kind of epic music you just don’t hear anymore in movies but not so overpowering that it distracted from the scenes but enhanced them to great effect.

The ending of this film was one of the most awesome endings I’ve ever seen (not the ending ending with the cabin in the woods, that kinda sucked, the climactic ending against the bad guy). Just no words. I don’t want to spoil it.

It’s hard to talk about the flaws of this movie without spoiling it and this isn’t a film that should be spoiled as my main problems with the film are story issues. There were some pacing issues here and there. Moments where you are confused by the actions of characters though they made sense in retrospect. If I had to discuss a “flaw”, I’d agree the movie is very derivative. It borrows heavily from other sci-fi films like Terminator, the Matrix, Total Recall, Independence day and even some 2001 mixed there too. But honestly, I wouldn’t hold it against the film. Lots of films borrow from other films especially sci-fi flicks. It is derivative in a sense however the final product melded from these other films was entertaining, interesting and gave a good albeit flawed story. It’s certainly not a walking mass of cliches and bland story-telling like movies like most badly done sci-fi movie are.

Overall a highly entertaining and very interesting flick to me. If you’re not a fan of sci-fi, it may not be your cup of tea but sci-fi lovers should definitely check it out at least once.

Photo

Sat, 27 Apr 2013 03:15:02 -0400

nowacking: katyanoctis: kayolomayram: jacobtheloofah: pervert...

Sat, 27 Apr 2013 03:06:22 -0400

nowacking:

katyanoctis:

kayolomayram:

jacobtheloofah:

pervertedhypocrisy:

SCIENCE

i’ve said it once and i’ll say it again: if you ever say you don’t like science, you just aren’t learning it right

SPECIAL BEAM CANNON

HEY

HEY JESSI

SPECIAL BASCAN

GODDAMIT KATY

agnecaiwolf: jesus-was-a-hindu: LOL I tried to scroll past. I...

Sat, 27 Apr 2013 03:06:15 -0400

agnecaiwolf:

jesus-was-a-hindu:

LOL

I tried to scroll past. I really did.

muertosiro: bonjerno

Wed, 24 Apr 2013 00:25:56 -0400

muertosiro:

bonjerno

funfrom4chan: Tony Stark

Wed, 24 Apr 2013 00:22:03 -0400

funfrom4chan:

Tony Stark

waaaahlbodayz: short-bread: [x] Stephen fry. Stop it. You...

Wed, 24 Apr 2013 00:19:13 -0400

waaaahlbodayz:

short-bread:

[x]

Stephen fry. Stop it.

You are clearly being too smart. You are not of this Earth.

Photo

Wed, 24 Apr 2013 00:18:02 -0400

cicida: THIS FUCK YES

Sat, 20 Apr 2013 03:31:52 -0400

cicida:

THIS FUCK YES

Photo

Tue, 16 Apr 2013 15:17:29 -0400

jetgreguar: tabloo: hipstersscience: Oda,you fucking...

Mon, 15 Apr 2013 00:24:18 -0400

jetgreguar:

tabloo:

hipstersscience:

Oda,you fucking bastard!

mother fucking oda

YES i was hoping this would show up

gideongaye: What a smart-aleck punk. :`D

Wed, 10 Apr 2013 16:28:38 -0400

gideongaye:

What a smart-aleck punk. :`D

Looper i.e. time travel is always a pain to write

Sat, 06 Apr 2013 09:20:00 -0400

Looper: Time travel plots can be the kiss of death to any story. They can over-complicate the plot very quickly and make it very easy for plotholes in the story to occur. When it comes to time travel stories, it’s important for the writer, befopre anything else, to pick and establish the rules he’s going to use and stick with them rigidly. Will they go for Back to the Future rules with alternate universes or the altering the past could change the very future or the “I’m my own Grandpa” rules where paradoxes that occurred have in fact always occurred and the natural course of events cannot be changed and our very lives are all on a fixed path that cannot deviate from its ultimate and inevitable fate. Naturally the latter is not very appealing to most audiences and screenwriters alike that opt to go for one of the former two to give the more appealing theme that we are all the makers of our own destiny. The most important thing however is to stay consistent with the rules you establish. With that said, how did Looper fare in this?

Not very good. The movie was pretty inconsistent with its time travel rules and honestly the very world it set up didn’t make a lot of sense including things outside of the time travel aspect. The whole movie is based on the premise that time travel is banned and no one but the mobs can use it (problem right there, how can the Mafia freely use something as dangerous as time-travel without any consequences by the government? Is the government deposed? is there no longer any authoritative figure? How do criminals get the means and know how to get something as sophisticated as time travel, something that belongs in the most top secret of government facilities which would merit more protection than Fort Knox? Never explained) to send back people they want whacked by their people in the past called Loopers because they can’t dispose of them in the present because everyone’s bodies are being tracked…somehow (so I guess there is still some authoritative figure present?). The Loopers kill the people they send, get the silver or gold tied to the body (pretty clever because metals wouldn’t lose their value unlike currency) and dispose of the bodies that would have no name or any sort of history. As a system, it’s executed as smartly as possible but that isn’t saying much as the system is pretty retarded. Why not just kill the people in the present and send them into the past dead so there’s no chance of escape (which happened twice in the movie), why not just send them back 65 million years into the time of the dinosaurs, why 30 years? Is that the limit they could send people? Fair enough, just say so movie, establish your rules, don’t not address these things, I understand they may not be relevant to the story but it goes a long way in establishing the legitimacy of the world you create making it easier for us as an audience to get into the world. There’s also a system where they send future versions of their Loopers to be killed off by their past selves for no real reason except increasing the chances of them escaping because the past versions wouldn’t be able to kill their future selves. Also I REALLY question a world that uses time travel for nothing more than body disposal.

But okay, you ignore all the inconsistencies and just accept them as “the rules”. However the movie was inconsistent to those very rules. There’s a scene where a future Looper that managed to escape was caught using the past version of the Looper. The past version has a location carved into his body which the future version will see on himself as a scar. Then the past version is slowly butchered and even has limbs amputated to force the future version to go to that area while he still has pieces remaining. Note, they can’t just kill the past version to eliminate the future version or it would introduce a paradox. Yet they can freely cut off the past version’s legs even though I’m pretty sure he wouldn’t have been able to escape from them without them in the first place and that somehow doesn’t cause a paradox? It makes for a cool and creepy scene to see a guy’s limbs just vanishing as he’s rushing to his destination but it doesn’t make a lot of sense. It’s flagrant breaking of your very own rules that bothers me and there are worse examples of that in the movie which I won’t get into as I’d end up over-complicating this post more than the movie.

With that said, despite my bashing, I really liked the movie. The movie’s saving grace is it’s not really about the time travel. They movie itself insistently went on and on on how we should ignore all the time travel inconsistencies because it would get too complicated. A plea on the part of the screen writers to just ignore the inconsistencies because they themselves don’t really care about it because it’s not important to the story. The theme of the story is your typical “Are our very destines predetermined? Hatred begets hatred, our attempts to changes our painful destinies with violence will ultimately result in those destinies. Can we do nothing to break the circle of hatred and destruction and blood?” yadda yadda yadda which was actually very well done and poignant.

The acting by Bruce Willis was great though I still don’t see what other people see in Joseph Gordon Levitt. He had his moments but he was just boring and monotone to me. I don’t know if Dark Knight Rises soured my impression of him that much but I just wasn’t very impressed. He’s like the male version of Natalie Portman to me. The movie also has the honor of having the creepiest four year old child actor, I’ve ever seen.

The cinematography was very, very good. The director did a great job experimenting with the camera to get some very visually appealing scenes and bizarre but suitable camera angles to fit with its outlandish and unique premise.

Overall, I liked the movie though I cannot deny that the inconsistencies of the writing hampered my opinion of the movie. People will insist and hell, even the writers of the movie were insisting, I should just turn my brain off and accept the stuff that didn’t make sense as lolz time travel but i can’t really because besides the fact that the story problems extended outside the time travel set up but on things the characters did not making sense or inadequate characterization or rushed plot developments, the whole movie gave a feeling of gimmickiness. That the time travel, which can be an interesting and fascinating story tool that you can build up a lot of interesting story developments with, was just an edgey twist to the writers in the end to make the story cool. Not to say the writers didn’t use the time travel to give us some of those aforementioned developments in ways only time travel stories would allow. But you’re still left with this feeling that such a fascinating and interesting wasn’t developed to its full potential. Still really liked the movie but I could have loved it.

Edit: Oh shit, I got the name of one of the actors wrong, it’s Joseph Gordon Levitt not Ryan Gosling lol I always get those two names mixed up. Thanks to the person who pointed it out.

The Hobbit i.e. Does stuff ever happen in this movie?

Sat, 23 Mar 2013 08:18:20 -0400

The Hobbit: I heard horror stories on the pacing of this film. And they were not wrong. Like wow did it move slow. There were many moments throughout the film where I was thinking in my head, a skilled director would have cut this out. And PJ is a skilled director, he proved as much with the original trilogy. What happened here? Was it pure consumerism? The desire to take, what should have been a simple children’s tale, and make another huge franchise out of it? Well I’m sure that’s part of the reason but I do feel a genuine love of the source material which does show in the film through the attention of little details, the sheer effort and care and heart that can be felt throughout the film (PJ was actually planning to shoot two films but got enough material during shooting for three which shows how much he loved working on this series). Anyone who compares this to Phantom Menace is insane. A hollow marketing venture, this film was not. Ultimately, it’s PJ using his clout and the name behind the franchise to be more self-indulgent whereas before he could not, now he can have all the fun he wants and the movie will still do well in the box office. With that said and taking into consideration all these factors, what did I ultimately think of the movie?

I loved it. But I don’t think a lot of people would like it. If you’re a die hard fan, the movie is like a love letter to you. If you’re not, you’ll probably get very bored. Me personally, I’m not an avid Tolkien fan (I’ve only read Fellowship and am working on Two Towers right now) but I am partial to fantasy series and I do love world building and exploring so not only did I not mind the hours (and oh were there hours) of them just walking or sitting and talking, I really liked them. But for people that just want some action or…things to happen, the movie will probably fail to impress. There are several action pieces spread throughout the movie (well done sequences as well) to try and give the movie a sort of flow between action and talking but there is still the feeling of there being too much talking. Again, I love talking and exploring and getting to know the characters but if you don’t, you’re probably not going to like the film very much.

In certain ways, I liked this film more than the original trilogy because the story is smaller and less restricted by the plot and all that intense drama with the ring. It’s more of a fun, adventurous romp with likable characters which I like because it’s less grand and epic and more easy to relate too. There’s no question that the original trilogy is better made in terms of tighter story writing and pacing but it’s all up to personal preference in the end. I actually liked this film more than Return of the King (which I always thought was the weakest of the original three).

I’ve heard issues raised on the tone of the movie. The Hobbit was not meant to be like Lord of the Rings, it was a more light-hearted children’s story (in fact, Tolkien tried to rewrite the Hobbit to match more the tone of LOTR but stopped because it just didn’t feel like the book he wrote originally) and trying to epicify it is going against what Tolkien intended. I heard complaints that the movie had tone all over the place going from trolls smearing hobbits with boogers to decapitation. I personally thought the tone was fine. Yes it got dark at times but nothing out of place for an adventure story. Monsters get killed all the time in them, you never think about the moral ramifications of it, it’s just what happens in those stories and I think the movie captured that feeling pretty well.

The acting was fantastic. Ian McKellen, Christopher Lee, Hugo Weaving, Cate Blanchett, Andy Serkis (I fucking love Gollum, his scenes in the movie were my favorite parts) all brought backstellar performances. Martin Freeman as young Bilbo was absolutely perfect and he’s a far better protagonist than Frodo in my opinion. I always found Frodo to be a bland character whereas young Bilbo is hilariously quirky and fun.

The cinematography was as gorgeous as can be expected from this series and thensome. Though with that said, there were parts of some pretty bad CGI that I didn’t expect from PJ and his team (especially when they get to the Goblin King with the testicle chin). Like where they even trying there?

With all that said, I had a really good time watching this movie. It was a fun adventure with characters I really liked. But it’s probably not a film for everyone. Just don’t go into it thinking it’s going to be a fast paced action flick like its predecessors. It’s not, it’s sloooooow. You have been warned.