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Friends In Your Head | Forums → Posts by Zarban
Good work! I'm about half-way thru. I like Iron Man quite a bit (not as much as Jake...), and I like Iron Man 2 enough. I don't get the hate.
But then, I don't get the hate for Spider-Man or X-Men 3. Or the love for Superman: The Movie. There are parts of Superman I like, but it's mostly really clunky and has one of the worst endings of any movie ever.
Stan Lee is supposed to actually be Hef. Remember that in Iron Man 2 he plays Larry King.
Thanks, Zarb. Come to LA sometime so we can all buy you a drink.
Virtual drink virtually accepted. I'm certain—certain—one of these spec screenplays for the Asylum will get greenlit. And then it's "Goodbye business consulting... Hello, Hollywood!"
/branching out into comedy with 1601 Pennsylvania Avenue: The President's Neighbors, starring Randy Quaid and Joe Biden (not sure yet who will play the president and who will play the crazy neighbor)
Chatroom was great fun! Jedi was terrific and Hellboy was fine; lots of good discussion even when it wasn't on-topic. Thanks!
R2 as an undercover agent working as a waiter. I swear to God someone needs to write a Chinatown caliber story with R2 as the gumshoe. Zarban when you're finished with ManBat vs Clam Demon could you get on that please?
For your consideration....
2D3D: DROID RUNNER
written by Zarban
story by Beldar and Zarban
A long time ago, in a naked city far away, "droid runner" 2D3D rolls to a late-night rendezvous with a dame in a white dress and 1940s hair who calls herself Lena Morgan. She says she's being followed and hires him to deliver a packet and her holorecording to one Ben Kenworthy, who she warns is also being watched. 2D puffs a little smoke—he's got a bad motivator—and takes the job.
2D3D arrives at Kenworthy's brownstone and is quickly shadowed by thugs who crack him on the dome with a blackjack. They fail to find the packet in his usual receptacle and conclude they've made a mistake.
2D awakens thru a blurry haze to meet teen motorcycle messenger Lucky Skyles, who helps him deliver the hidden packet to Kenworthy, a dapper ex-cop with a neat white beard. The packet contains detailed information about a Nazi spy ring that has infiltrated the police force. Lucky's uncle is the police captain. "You don't think he's mixed up in this?" Ben assures him that his uncle is a "swell guy."
2D3D tunes into police band radio to reveal that Lena was arrested after their meeting. The three go post her bail with the help of scoundrel lawyer Hank Soles ("You never heard of Millener & Falcolm, Attorneys at Law? We got Kessell off with 12 parsecs."), while a shadowy figure places a mysterious phone call. Lena asks Hank to take her home—"Your place or mine, sweetheart?"—but they're snatched by thug Bobby Fettle, and Hank is sapped.
Ben, Lucky, and 2D see this but are confronted by police captain Darryl Vanderberg—Lucky's uncle—who demands the spy ring information. 2D pops out a revolver to hold him off, but there is a shootout, and Vanderberg kills Ben. He tries to get Lucky to stay with him, but Lucky calls him a Nazi, and they fight with police laser truncheons before Lucky runs away. They elude the police, thanks to 2D's tricky interference with the police radio calls.
Fettle takes Hank and Lena to his boss, "Hustler" Jablonski. Jablonski, who speaks only German, explains thru his interpreter-droid Trey-Naught-Deuce that if she doesn't hand over the info on the spy ring, Hank will "sleep with the fishes tonight"—while she remains his "very special guest."
After some time, 2D and Lucky arrive at Jablonski's nightclub on the messenger motorcycle (with sidecar). In the back of the club, 2D knocks out a waiter droid and reappears in his white coat, carrying a tray of drinks. Lucky pretends to have a message for Jablonski. The captive Lena, dressed in a scandalously revealing gown, is forced to sing "That's No Moon River" on stage while Lucky claims that Captain Vanderberg wants Hank and Lena delivered to him. 2D frees Hank and slips away, but Fettle intervenes when Jablonski calls Lucky's bluff.
While Hank and Lucky are taken for a ride to the wharf, 2D frees Lena, and the two zoom off on the messenger motorcycle. They are spotted, and two motorcycle cops get the call to pursue. In a harrowing chase thru the warehouse district, with 2D shooting back, Lena makes the cops crash.
Arriving at the wharf, 2D holds his pistol on Fettle and his goons while Lena unties Hank and Lucky. But Vanderberg arrives with some cops, and a fight ensues. Hank protects Lena and takes out a couple of heavies before getting injured; Lena protects him and takes out Fettle. 2D takes out a couple heavies as well but gets shot.
Lucky confronts his uncle as the leader of the spy ring in an epic laser truncheon fight. Just when Vanderberg has Lucky down, 2D recovers enough to shoot him in the back of the head—which causes sparks! Vanderberg shakes and cries "Heil Hitler" and other Naziisms in warped audio until his face pops off, revealing him to be a Nazi droid replacement for Lucky's real uncle!
The remaining cops and goons scatter. Lena and Hank kiss. 2D replays Vanderberg's meltdown, which he holorecorded. Lucky works out that his real uncle was a good guy murdered and replaced by a robot. They all make plans to go the State Department with their information.
And everyone thanks 2D3D, droid runner extraordinaire.
I don't really love the Potter movies (and never read the books) but those guys deserve some kind of special Oscar for not fucking up something that 200 million people love. Seriously. And it's so easy to do. If Coppola hadn't screwed the pooch with Godfather Part III, we'd have probably had 10 or 12 of those by now.
And with regard to Alan Rickman, you know what that guy did on the set of his last movie? He killed an actual, real-life vampire that was stalking the cast and crew. That guy does not get enough credit.
The way the speeder chase unfolds felt like a video game. Like they were setting up the game tie-in.
Well, it's practically a direct lift of Ms Pac-Man.
The scene with Carrie Fisher ... Her voice is low in Jedi, was she a chain smoker back then?
She was very young when she did Star Wars. So by Jedi, her balls had dropped.
R2 as an undercover agent working as a waiter. I swear to God someone needs to write a Chinatown caliber story with R2 as the gumshoe. Zarban when you're finished with ManBat vs Clam Demon could you get on that please?
First, ManBat vs Clam Demon? That's awesome! You'll get a "story by" credit. Second, 2D3D: Droid Runner is on its way! We'll give him a fedora-shaped dome, a pop-out revolver, and a "bad motivator" that makes him puff smoke from time to time.
Wait. Suddenly, that sounds less crazy stupid than crazy awesome.
I love it. I even love the ewoks. Fuck you, ewok haters. Yub yub!
Decidedly not in favor of Hayden Christensen appearing at the end.
EDIT: I'll also say I don't like that Boba Fett was clumsied to death.
Zarban wrote:My other 9 screenplays for the Asylum are in development hell.
And what makes you think The Asylum use screenplays?
To be fair, my screenplays are mostly pictures I've clipped out of magazines or found on the Internet and given different captions. My screenplay for 101-Foot Geisha is just a single picture of a naked Japanese girl with little tanks pasted at the bottom and the words "OMG! Radioactive sushi made her 101-feet tall! Now she's attacking our city!" A word balloon coming out of her mouth says, "Me so hungry!! 
"
That one's getting good buzz. It's in second draft now. I gave her pointy teeth and "angry eyes".
I kept second-guessing the film on the first viewing because I expect so much from Nolan (same happened in The Prestige), so, yeah, more enjoyable on second viewing. The snow looked good to me.
What did you guys think of Joseph Gordon-Levitt? I've always loved him and would have put money on him against DiCaprio, but I thought he was awkward in the first act vs a much smoother Leo. But JGL was terrific when it came to the all-business scenes later on (zero G action).
Is that worse than being considered enormously promising and then never living up to that promise? 
Fortunately for Frost, his poetry was all good; some was just deeper than others.
Nothing unusual in that, as you have to give them some order (and it's better then the Koran's sorting the books by length). Unless you're saying he put all the simple ones in the first book published and left the complex stuff for the last ones, instead of having each book cover a wide range. That would be sneaky
Yes, that's the implication. We're talking about a guy who wrote poems that mean the opposite of what they say. ("the road less traveled" "good fences make good neighbors" ...).
You can also give a pig a day of beauty and makeup, if'n you want. DIF ain't less beautiful on account of she wears overalls.
/Cletus
Dude, that's a really cool idea. The last bit, I mean.
I'm on it. I'll start writing 2011: Superbat vs Superego tomorrow evening. Cross your fingers. My other 9 screenplays for the Asylum are in development hell.
Dorkman's front-page observation about Shyamalan's career making more sense backwards reminds me of my old English professor's story that Robert Frost wrote scads of poems and, when he was ready to start publishing them, organized them into different books so that they seemed to progress from less to more complex.
I'm late to the party, but PHEW! what a party it is. I pretty much agree entirely with Michael and Teague: awesome flick but Nolan made some odd choices. He pulls out some big, big guns in the scenes where Page gets recruited and then mostly leaves them on the mantle. You can almost hear Egon saying "Don't cross the streams!" ...But then they never do cross the streams.
Worse, Page is immediately relegated to being DiCaprio's psychologist. We don't even get a montage of her designing the levels. What the fuck? Even Rocky had a montage!
Regarding the "train > people > Mal" progression of Cobb's obsession intruding, that works great thematically, but cinematically, it's awful. Trains are more cinematic than crazy wives.
Regarding the ending: (SPOILERS FOR OTHER NOLAN FILMS) I was pretty convinced the whole time that the entire story was in Cobb's head and that the players were going to turn out to be working for Mal to get Cobb to wake up and be with her and the kids. Cobb planting the idea that Mal wasn't in reality and that made her obsess and kill herself was goofy: they created their world together; of course she knew she was dreaming. Besides, Nolan ALREADY USED the oh-god-it's-my-fault-my-wife-committed-suicide gambit TWICE, in Memento and The Prestige. What next? Bruce Wayne's parents' death will turn out to be suicide, and it's Bruce's fault?!
Who is killing the stars of Forbidden Planet?! Someone save Robby the Robot!
This brings us to Down in Front. *hugs Down in Front*
RLM's Phantom Menace review was genius, and his other stuff was good too. Attack of the Clones was really not as good, so I haven't rush over to watch Revenge of the Sith.
Meanwhile DIF has maintained a solid level of quality week after week—with, I might add, 95% less belching and racial slurs than almost any other commentary group.
*hugs Down in Front*
Just listened to this one. It shows that it's an early one, but it's good fun and good analysis. Thanks!
Doctor Who is sooo good these days.....
Finally got around to seeing Big Lebowski. I can see the talent, but I feel like I'm missing the point somewhere.
I get warm feelings whenever I hear Jeff Bridges referred to as "the Dude" but the film itself doesn't do much for me. I don't understand why the Dude would hang out with a guy like Walter.
I actually really liked BURN AFTER READING just because of the sheer balls involved overall, and particularly in the above spoiler.
Yeah, up to that point, the film could have been a Bob Hope vehicle. The problem is, I think it might have worked better if it HAD been a Bob Hope vehicle (at the very least, cast Betty Grable in the Frances McDormand role 
).
If you're gonna do a Coen Bros series, please stick The Hudsucker Proxy, Ladykillers or The Man Who Wasn't There into the mix somewhere.
The Ladykillers had SOOOO much going for it. The opening scenes are just gorgeous. I LOVE Tom Hanks' demented Colonel Sanders/Foghorn Leghorn. But jeez how did the Marlon Wayons and JK Simmons characters get in there? And how did they NOT have an early morning hearse chase with the sheriff, set to gospel music??
Anyway, I see that you guys haven't done anything recent...
Oh. I was just going to suggest going totally retro and doing some stuff in black and white, like The Maltese Falcon.
Don't get me wrong—the film has got style out the wazoo. But consider just the action sequences.
The Tin Tin fight is basically just a brawl with a pretty cool ending. The Fun Boy scene is cool but pretty small scale. The car chase just knocks over some trash cans and then blows the car up as it goes off a pier. Now, that's followed by the burning crow imagery, which is full on awesome, but it's just a button on a so-so stunt.
Then Draven gets shot up and proceeds to slaughter a roomful of baddies in one of the most disjointed shootouts on film. It has its moments but you can hardly see what's going on.
The final confrontation starts out really cool and then turns into a pretty conventional shootout before getting cool again with a rooftop sword fight in the rain and a conclusion right out of a Hammer horror picture (Dracula Has Risen From the Grave, if I'm not mistaken).
None of these has the wild inventiveness of Desperado or the flawless choreography of Jackie Chan's First Strike or the embedded subtext of Batman Returns. Are those better movies overall? No, but I'm just talking about action sequences (altho Batman Returns is no slouch).
I'm six minutes in and you've already repeated unsubstantiated ugly rumors about two popular public figures. Somewhere, Snopes is weeping.
EDIT: Disney and Michael Jackson. Disney fixed his cartoons after getting complaints about ethnic stereotype gags; George Lucas hasn't done that. And Jackson was clearly just being blackmailed by fraudsters.
Fine work; great to revisit. A lot of reminiscing, but still a lot of fun. I agree with Teague that the film sets out to tell a simple revenge tale with style and succeeds in spades.
My one gripe is that the action sequences aren't much to write home about. I don't think that, as Teague proposed, if The Matrix hadn't come along this would have been thought of as having the most stylish action sequences of the decade. There was plenty of Woo and Tarantino and stuff inspired by them at that time.
Also, forget that Bruce Lee curse, shit. Shannon Lee and Linda Lee Caldwell are alive and well.
Oh yeah? General Robert E Lee is dead.
I just finished watching the kevin Costner film Mr. Brooks, and it surprised me, I didn't think I was going to like it. It's an interesting take on addiction, and the chemistry between Kevin and William Hurt is very good. Let me know what you think, It might make an interesting commentary.
Does anyone get into a gun or sword fight over a princess or a treasure? And what, exactly, explodes?
Friends In Your Head | Forums → Posts by Zarban
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