I'll say this right now, I think Gravity is a much bigger game-changer than Avatar was, both in terms of VFX and filmmaking technique. This feels like a new cinematic medium entirely, something ultra immersive and experiential that takes the in-the-moment intensity from first person videogames, and adapts it for the film format.

I honestly think this could be a blue-print for many movies going forward as a fundamentally different way of telling a story visually. It's the best next step past the Found Footage genre. That genre tries to disorient the user to try to simulate the visceral experience of being there, but the end result is usually that the movie actually distances you from the events happening by making you feel like you're watching a recording.

Cuaron's approach is like the next best version of those kinds of movies, where instead of disorientation, you feel completely and utterly like you're there in the moment, and there's no cuts to break you out of that reality. It's almost less of a movie, than it is an experience. Wanna feel like you're in space? Watch Gravity in Imax 3d. What's stopping us from having an "Abyss"-style thriller filmed in this same aesthetic to capture the experience of being underwater? It feels like a whole host of possibilities has been unleashed by the success of this one movie.

I'm with Zarban on this. She was smart when writing the later books to look at minor things she'd mentioned off-handedly (and without much detail) before and appropriate some of them where she could, but none of these examples look like detailed forward planning.

I always hear those complaints and have never gotten it. Maybe I need to re-read it again with a critical mind, but at the time OOTP was my favorite book in the series, it might still be. The fact that the characters shift from being kids solving mysteries at Hogwarts, to actively having to go out and fight bad guys out in the real world was always awesome to me. I think the entire finale at the ministry is amazing, I think Umbridge is one of the series' best villains, it's got possibly my favorite Quidditch match of the series. But again, maybe it is all just filler and I'm only remembering the good stuff, I'd have to re-read it.

You have to realize that a lot of people like myself were growing up just as the books were coming out, so they end up connecting pretty deeply to your own life experiences as you read them. I don't think they're the greatest thing ever or anything, but as someone born in 91, the books lined up pretty much perfectly for me, where I would age just as the characters aged (each book takes place over a single year, for the uninitiated).
Thus, the books end up being a pretty powerful story about adolescence and growing up, and get progressively darker and more complex just as my own sensibilities and outlook did.

It's pretty great that they start as very fun, lighthearted scooby doo mysteries, which is what you're super into when you're 8, and then by the time you're 15 they're about epic battles to the death. This means that you really feel it when the stakes get raised above the more innocent earlier adventures. I remember Order of the Phoenix being the turning point for me, where suddenly our kid protagonists are in these life or death duels with expert mass-murdering sorcerors, and there is an immense sense of "This shit just got real".

So ya, generally speaking, they're really good books, with good positive messages for kids (unlike garbage like Twilight) that I think end up resonating especially strongly with an entire generation of readers who grew up with them. I don't know how well it'd hold up if I went back to read them now as an adult, but I think it's the perfect series to start someone out on when they're 8 or 9.

Eh, some of the magic duels work. I still think Deathly Hallows Part 1 is a really weak movie (they REALLY should've cut the shitty boring middle of that book and just made a single amazing movie instead of 2 kinda decent ones), but I LOVE the magic battle in the diner that's filmed like a movie shootout. When the series went for it, there were some really cool battles, they just never pushed it far enough in general. Like, imagine what someone like Terry Gilliam could've done with the concept of a MAGIC battle.

Just saw that myself. Wish there was more to it, but it's still really cool that they took the the time to make it.

And it ends with him killing himself.
Directed by David Fincher.

As long as it doesn't turn into a Spiderman 2 style unanimous hatefest. I'll still take Rises over pretty much any Marvel movie, at least it looks like a real movie instead of animated concept art

But I do get his perspective to an extent. Ultimately, what is the value in watching in detail the suffering of other people for 2 hours, what does that illuminate about the human condition or our modern world? If the takeaway of the movie is "slavery was really really terrible", well, I believe you, but that's not something I want to sit through. There's a reason Spielberg makes Schindler's List about the people that were saved.

I don't agree that we should only tell the uplifting stories and not the depressing ones, but I'm generally not a fan of watching movies about people being systematically beaten down.

That being said, it sounds like this one is exceptionally well made from both a filmmaking and acting standpoint, so I'm curious to check it out.

I'm partial to Adywan's fan edits myself. If you're going to fuck around with the originals, at least do changes that make the movies better, not worse.

But ya, I'd love to see the original theatrical edits in a blu-ray format at some point, since I literally have no memory of them at this point, my only exposure being the VHS release when I was like 5.

Really? I guess I kinda just grew up watching HBO, so that stuff was my bread and butter. Don't think I turned out particularly messed up or anything, though I suppose your mileage may vary. I mean you wanna cherry-pick the less scary ones. I wouldn't show a 7 year old The Terminator, but T2 would be fine I think. When you get down to it, a lot of those 80s flicks are just more violent GI-Joe cartoons, so I think stuff like Eraser, Last Action Hero, Commando, and Tango & Cash would go over fine at that age.

Also around that time, Army of Darkness is a great intro to horror, since it's very slapstick and largely just an action-adventure movie.

BTW, if you for some reason haven't read it, Drew McWeeny's Film Nerd 2.0 column should be your first stop when deciding these movies, since he documents his kids' reactions and the kinds of questions they'll ask:
http://www.hitfix.com/motion-captured/f … things-are