I have the same issue with color calibration. In the Store, every effin TV is turned up with the "SUPER CONTRAST" buttons pushed all the way in. I want to go to each and every TV and turn off all "expand contrast" "extra black" "digital vibrance", "XD" or "punch" settings, to get a nice flat-ish filmic image where  you can see all the way into the shadows and nothing clips, and it is nice and smooth and somewhat desaturated in appearance.

/Z

So, can someone Enlighten me how the plan is to treat the DIF vs the Intermission streams? Now I get all episodes twice get all episodes twice which seems redududundant to to me me?

/Z /Z

I actually *do* have a problem with the color grading in LOTR; watching the BTS's, I often find myself thinking the "before" is much better than "after" (especially when they turn stuff stupid-blue). And yes, I have the same issue as Teague with the "bloomy" stuff, coz it *literally* is a copy of the layer, blurred, and screened on top (they even say this in some docu) and it looks just as cheap as that. It makes it look like a dream sequence, while it's not... like Frodo waking up in Rivendell... way too bloomy and defocused, made me think it was a dream.

Basically, it looks to me as if they had a new toy in the toybox and totally overdid it. It sohuld have been dialed back 20% in pretty much every case.

/Z

Ah, the Dark Knight... I have a ton of issues with this film. A ton.

First, it's too damned long; it should have been two movies. I think it's supposed to be a subversion of the style "Oh you thought it was OVER, didya?" but it comes at the wrong time and place somehow.... IMHO.

2ndly, I hate the actress change with a passion. Chick from first movie == Way better

3rdly, Harvey Dent never worked for me on SO many levels. 1st, I'm not enough of a Batman Reader (couldn't care less kind of guy) to even "know" Harvey Dent == "Twoface" (I forgot this since seeing the old batman with Tommy-Lee Jones as Twoface), so maybe this would have played out better for someone pre-suspecting "this goody-two-shoes politician guy will turn to evil". I don't get, buy the "turn", even a little.... it totally, absolutely and 100% DOESN'T work for me even a little bit.

Coupled with that the weirdocity of the effect.... guys... he is missing half the face... you see his teeth. Here's an experiment; Pull the left side of your mouth open with your finger so you can see a bunch of teeth. Now speak menacingly with a deep barytone Evil Things like mr Twoface does. GOOD LUCK WITH THAT! You'll MAYBE be able to audition for daffy duck with the face looking like that.

It's an awesome effect - mind you - but makes absolutely zero sense.

The Joker is good (but not as great as everyone wants to claim; I thikn this movie suffers from an enormous does of "Oh noes, the actor actually died, so we must be nice to him poshumously!!"), but any interaction between Joker and Batman is so 100% ruinied by the the stupid batman voice.

Yeah, 4th, the Batman voice? I'm like... W. T. F.?

And 5:th... cellphones as sonar? Rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrriiiiiiggghhhht.

I personally MUCH prefer Batman Begins to TDK, I find it overlong, dull, unrealistic and the new actress looks/acts all wrong and is totally unrealistic as a love interest for Bruce. Yes, it has WAY better effects than "Begins" and "Begins" isn't without it's flaws (microwave rays that boil water but don't hurt people, consisting of 70% water? Rrrrrrrrrrrrriiiiggghht!!) but it's yet another case of "becoming is more interesting than being", IMHO.

I think Heath Ledgers untimely demise caused the cult status of this film, and not much that is actually in the film per se.

My 2 Swedish öre.

/Z

Atom "did" nothing, he was uncovered by the water flow and the kid just got snagged on the robots arm. There was nothing "miraculous". Heck, the movie even made a *point* about how *non miraculous* the robot was when the kid laughed and said "Dad, you are talking to a ROBOT" and laughed.

That's my interpretation, and I'm actually glad it DIDN'T go the sappy "the robot learned humanity and got a SOUL through a magical short-circuit from a childs tear that crystallized on the motherboard" crap that is going around.

/Z

To explain, this was made by a bunch of crazy Finns on their own (the same guys who made "Star Wreck")

They have a cool new blog post of the process here, which includes the older trailers (I really liked the original teaser w. the motorbike, loved the music there, hope it's part of the actual film....)

Here's the blog entry http://blog.starwreck.com/2012/02/08/ir … -released/

/Z

In what way was this ep lost? Drunken file delete?

/Z

Dave: Open the pod bay doors, HAL

HAL: I'm sorry Dave, I'm afraid I can't do that.

Dave: Sudo Open the pod bay doors, HAL

HAL: God damn it dave! Pod bay doors open.

/Z

The Ian is HERE? Teague and myself was just talking about you! It's almost as if..... it was predestined (or, perhaps, coz Teague invited you since we talked? Who knows? )

WELCOME! In the Future! Probably! Ideality!

/Z

OK, I can't say I am *100%* comfortable with the change in direction. Here's my worry:

If you do a commentary for a movie, you are kinda forcing yourself to talk about the movie for 1.5-ish hours, and to adress *all* of it, which I really like. While you in theory could say "lets talk about film X", and in a freeform format simply talk about it, there is a risk that

a) You forget to talk about certain things
b) You end prematurely, as in "okay... so we covered Transformers 3, what shall we talk about now"... crickets.... or you jump to the next movie and blow your wad too soon....

While I agree, some movies simply don't merit a full-length commentary, and I frankly preffer the dissective commentaries that aren't really paying attention to whats on screen anyway... maybe this will be all good. Still, the act of you guys actually watching it somehow... spurs you on, in a way that I like.

Having said that, I enjoy the intermissions, and kinda dislike the arbitrary 30 minute imposed limit of it (always ends when it's getting good*) so maybe this will all be perfect?

Irregardless, I hold a completely irrational fear that DiF will decline in this new format. So please, prove me wrong.

Oh, and I want more Trey anecdotes. Now that Batman Returns made the list (yay!) I can die happy to know I will hear the Walken story. The only movie where Walken is more Walken than in B:R is probably a View to a Kill.

/Z

* = "Thats what she said"

The real question is, will this bring any influx to the Down In Front community and listeners to the actual movie commentary podcast itself (or the intermission?)

The cynical side of me says no, because wonderful as this C&H thing is, it's too tangential to the core thing being done at Down In Front to have fans coming in based of that becoming fans of the show.

Now, new visitors, go ahead and prove me wrong. Down In Front is a fantastic podcast if you are even a little bit into movies.

/Z