The real disappointment of the year was the cessation (suspension?) of FIYH. No more WAYDM podcasts to look forward to.
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The real disappointment of the year was the cessation (suspension?) of FIYH. No more WAYDM podcasts to look forward to.
So the movie of the year is....? Besides Mad Max Fury Road, of course.
Disappointment of the year? Tomorrowland? Avengers 2?Jupiter Ascending? Terminator Genisys? Spectre? One can add another dozen to this list.
Box office hit of the year: Jurassic World - biggest selling non-James Cameron film of all time.
Score of the year? Inside Out.
Sleeper hit from out of left field? Ex Machina.
VFX of the year? Given the fact that Hobbit 3 didn't even get nominated (as it was more of the same), should ep7 be nominated (also nothing new)? None of the Prequels got gongs for VFX. Dunno what would qualify this year if the criteria is innovation not quantity of VFX. No Gravity or Life of Pi or Benjamin Button type of movies where we see something new. Probably Fury Road is the best bet. Ant Man maybe. The Martian?
Film most likely to walk away with all the Razzies? I'd nominate Terminator Genisys
Second viewing.. some observations
Saw it on the biggest IMAX screen in the world tonight. More questions...
* Why did Fin want to leave in Rey in the bar? And 10 minutes later he was freaking out when she was being carried away. It's like that contrived rom-com formula where they have be break up for a bit, except this one felt totally unmotivated.
* So R2D2 had the map the whole time and was just sulking? Didn't anyone know that? And Kylo knew what piece was missing and couldn't figure it was the Jedi Temple?
* Is the Falcon a piece of shit or not? They want it both ways. Traders steal it off each other (so it must be in demand) then it sits under tarps collecting rust and is their second choice.
* Why doesn't Chewie fire his bow several times when Han dies? Just one lame shot and a long pause and then turns to stormtroopers. His best mate just died. He should have been hammering Kylo with rapid fire as soon as the saber went through Han. And what's he doing during the whole duel scene? He could've helped them out. Lucky the planet took so long to explode as Poe blew up the thermal oscillator ages ago.
* Han seemed to frequent Maz's bar a lot but was unaware Luke's saber was stashed in the basement.
* Still not clear if the Empire is the same as the First Order and what the relationship between the Sith and First Order is (is one subordinate to the other?)
* Rey has to be Luke's daughter, right? There were a few subtle clues in the flashback sequence. Luke got drunk around the bonfire on Endor and knocked someone up.
The fact that his projection was so big was odd too (they just use that huge room for teleconferencing with the Snokester, I guess?).
They can SKYPE with giant holograms, but they can't transmit a simple star map. It's got to be transported on a USB stick.
I recorded a two hour podcast today with four of my friends where went over the whole movie and our thoughts about everything. I'll post a link when it's uploaded.
Great - looking forward to it
Red Letter Media should be having their review out shortly too
I love how Carrie Fisher can just speak her mind and take the piss out the movie/franchise on the PR junket circuit. Everybody else has to stay on message.
If Shia LeBouf soils his own nest, he's ostracized by Hollywood, but Fisher gets a free pass.
"Oh, look, we one upped the Death Star with a fucking PLANET. Guess you're pretty fucked now- oh, wait, damn, you broke that too. Next time we're just using fighters, that seems like a better tactic."
Maybe VIII will up the ante and actually have a literal Death Star instead of 'Death Moon' and 'Death Planet'. Then IX will have to have a Death Nebula or Death Globular Cluster or some shit, although that doesn't roll off the tongue.
I'm gonna go out on a limb and say there's one aspect where the Prequels were better than Ep7, and that's the score. The prequel scores had some great new themes e.g Duel of the Fates. I couldn't detect any iconic new themes. It was more a copy-and-paste rehash. I'll have to hear it some more.
Even the Hobbit scores, also paling in comparison to LOTR, had a few good new cues (Misty Mountains, Starlight), but so far the Ep7 score leaves me cold. Williams is old though.
Anyone got any ideas about this enigmatic map? Who drew the map? Why? Why was it in two pieces? How did Max have it? It's like JJ had a script meeting: let's make the map the MacGuffin...great idea!
But then then they forgot to fill in the details/context.
So The Force is strong in Rey because... her parents? Random genetic mutation? It is her Destiny?
Her torture-chair escape scene was kinda funny. Drop your weapon, bitch.
Also I thought we'd get a scene in which Leia and Chewie console each other about Han (did we?). Was disappointed when I didn't see it.
Leia consoles Rey who...she's never met before? But we'd all console Rey, right?
How did Poe get off Jakku? Why not just take the droid off the girl instead of offer her 60 portions?
The council scene where they're planning the attack on the star-killer base was like a piss-take self-parody. Like in Spectre, Bond shoots at a pipe with a pistol and the entire base blows up.
The tentacled creatures on the loose in that ship reminded me of the Cabin in the Woods scene.
Yeah, Star Wars IV amazing at the time (I was 7, the perfect demographic) as we'd never seen that level of spectacle before, but today we've seen greater spectacle e.g. Return of the King, so VII was underwhelming from that point of new. We've even seen collapsing planets before in JJ's Star Trek.
Is it hype or just the fact it's not Ep1-bad? That's a low benchmark. We'll see how this stands the test of time. It's good enough to whet the appetite for VIII. Overall, it's a nice setup for a new trilogy, but it's not ground-breaking on any level.
So the teddy bears victory in VI was rather modest. Not much really changed.
Yeah I also thought the untrained toilet cleaner matching it with a Major-League Sith Dude was a bit far fetched.
Any Chewie's gun can wipe out 3-4 armored storm troopers in one shot (which bizarrely surprises Han after all these years) and yet it only scratches Kylo.
Can't believe JJ tripled-down on Death Star 3.0 after people were complaining that VI was merely rehashing IV.
And a teenage scavenger who's never flown the Falcon before can suddenly manoeuvre it everywhere, dodging trained pilots. And the Falcon, even more of a rust-bucket, can warp, I mean, jump, so accurately now, it materializes right on the tree tops. It's basically become a teleportation device, not a transport.
Loved the crashed destroyer shots.
Yes, and all the call backs. Must have been dozens of them. I had a bad feeling about fan-service. We panned lazy nostalgia with Terminator Genisys (no new ideas!), don't know why it gets a free pass here.
In all, 95% is generous. I'd dial that down a few notches. It's hampered by having to be faithful to the old 1970s pantomine style which is itself a call-back to earlier movies. We're used to a more contemporary style (tone, scoring, editing, humour, etc).
Actors were fine. The round Wall-E-like robot was cute, but that left R2 with not much to do except mourn. Why did he wake up at the end again?
What do you guys think about the movie not being very self-contained? Han's son's backstory, Snoke, and the ending left you asking more questions.
Will see it again in 3D IMAX for a second look. Right now, I'm still leaning towards Fury Road as movie of the year.
I'm steadily watching The Hobbit: The Tolkien Edit, which is a 4:21h long super cut of all the movies.
I haven't watched The Battle of the Five Armies yet either, so I'll watch this now, and then maybe later watch all the extended editions and see for myself, but for now, I just want the story, not the bloated exposition and side-plots that are too mushy and pointless, even for a season of One Tree Hill.But yeah, my point is, there are actually several fan edits out there. This one in particular has gotten some great reviews as well.
That Tolkien edit came out in January or so, long before the additional 25 minutes in the BOTFA extended edition, so misses the funeral and Dain coronation, etc. In fact it came out before the HD theatrical release.
It's only now in November that all the material is there for an editor to draw upon. In fact, the appendices show some partially finished deleted scenes too that could be used as well as source material.
Just ploughing through the 11 hours of extras on the blu-ray EE set. Amazing bonus features, as always. Peter Jackson's team does the best DVD extras by far, ever since LOTR. Must be 70 hours worth in total for the two trilogies. Some parts are warts 'n all. Some are just contrived "funny" events that happened on set, rather than a technical lecture on behind-the-scenes. Very watchable. The craft of Weta Workshop is extraordinary. They burned through more money that you didn't see on screen than the entire budgets of other tentpole movies.
The commentary is alright - but I get the sense both Jackson and Boyens are happy to see the last of Middle Earth. Jackson doesn't seen very knowledgeable on the Tolkien mythology despite being immersed in the universe for 15 years. It's not that informative and repeats material already in the extensive Appendices.
Now waiting for some fan commentaries of the EE Hobbit movies (wish it was a FIYH marathon) and a fan edit.
This WALL trailer for later this year looks awesome...
Great to hear the positive word. Going to see this on the weekend hopefully. Do you think this is worth watching in 3D?
For some weird reason, The Martian never got an IMAX release, which is where I see all my 3D movies. So I watched it in 2D on a VueXtreme Screen and it was fine. It's more the story than the visuals. Matt Damon is vlogging for a lot of it, so I don't feel 3D is essential like it was in Gravity or Avatar.
THE MARTIAN
After taking a gigantic dump on science, scientists, and the scientific method in Prometheus, Ridley Scott tries to redeem himself with a movie honouring NASA, JPL, and hard, no nonsense science. And successful too. Good on him.
The movie has the same sentiments as Interstellar and Tomorrowland... Exploration, cooperation, solving problems ourselves without resorting to superheroes, the chosen one, or some supernatural mumbo jumbo. And a there's no punch-up next to a ticking bomb for a change. Recommended.
Yes, I'm looking forward to a good fan edit once all the Extended Editions are out in November and you have about 8 hours of raw material to cull down to about 3-4 hours. The action sequences can be trimmed, a lot of the Kili love subplot, Stephen Fry's assistant in BOTFA, most of the stupid dwarf antics, etc. There might even be a decent movie there for a dedicated editor to extract. Whether it's worth anyone's time - probably several weeks' worth of work...
Love the Wally Pfister cinematography too in Insomnia. And a rare Nolan commentary track on DVD, although I must admit he's a little bland (seems overly guarded) in his comments and as an interview subject generally.
Apparently the Hobbit trilogy costs $1.1BILLION! and it's dubious whether all the money the NZ taxpayer kicked in (almost $200M!) actually paid off, as there are hardly any locations for tourists to visit...
Good if you've read Into Thin Air and know the story well.
Average if you haven't.
Jason Clarke finally does some decent acting.
The events around 4pm on 10th May are the emotional fulcrum of the drama where the critical decisions are made. Outdoor aficionados will know what I mean.
If you're all really good boys, you might get a ep7 commentary next year...
Doesn't reach the dizzy heights of Ghost Protocol, but a solidly entertaining entry. Some truly death-defying stuff from Cruise yet again (the diving sequence from the trailer is incredibly impressive, and the huge car chase set-piece is deftly handled as well), and the cast are all likable and engaging (this is the first movie I've actually liked Jeremy Renner in). There's a great sense of humor throughout, which is much appreciated. The only major complaints I have are both technical—first, while this isn't color-graded within an inch of its life like most similar movies these days, the orange sheen to everyone's skin is rather offputting. Second, the strobe cutting early on is extremely irritating; one early sequence in particular was bloody impossible to decipher due to the number of cuts per second. This got better as the movie went on, but I was bothered enough by its early appearances to be taken out of the experience.
Before Mission Impossible 5: Rogue Nation, there was a trailer to The Man from Uncle, and posters outside to Spectre, and earlier this year was Kingsman. Starting to get spy-thriller fatigue. They're turning into Marvel-esque overload. Plot's always the same: spies have to chase some MacGuffin through exotic locales with some babe in an opera gown, using gadgets & quips, etc, all while not getting their styled hair messed up. Villain is some generic PC (can't offend anyone!) group that finds humanity degenerate and so we must start again by destroying everything.
Write down all forms of transportation on pieces of paper and throw them in a hat. Now pull out one piece - that's the chaser. Second piece: the chasee. Third piece: The chaser or chasee changes their vehicle mid-way through chase. Now which country is giving you the best tax credits this year? That's where we'll set it.
And what crazy stunt haven't we seen yet? Let's write a scene based on that. Repeat for five actions sequences (they cost $20M each and we got over $100M budget based on the A-list star) and get the algorithm to shuffle the scenes until we get something vaguely coherent. Or not, doesn't matter. It's a thrill ride.
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