I haven't watch the video in question, but during TS3, I felt like it wasn't as original as the previous two and wasn't "necessary". Both TS2 and TS3 feel like the makers said, "Andy isn't going to play with Woody and Buzz forever, right? Isn't there more tale to tell?" But TS1 basically established that a boy never forgets or stops loving his toys even tho he stops playing with them, and that's enough to close the story. (It's not like every drama ends with the main character dying even tho, you know, everybody dies.)

Regardless, TS3 is a good story well told and is emotionally effective.

This is true - there don't seem to be many examples of the "guy sets out to conquer an enemy, then joins with them to fight back against his own people" plotline, outside the modern era.   Other movies with similar elements that I can think of are Little Big Man, Quigley Down Under and Enemy Mine (I give Enemy Mine special props for putting a rather unique spin on the "falling in love with the native girl" subplot. :-)   

Supposedly the earliest example of "Wait a sec - Indians are people, too" was Broken Arrow in 1950, which also has a number of elements in common with the Ferngully plotline.    From the '50's onward, fighting Indians gradually became less of a thing in Westerns, the genre became more about gunslingers and shootouts.   

Even so, there were still occasional throwbacks like Zulu, which was a good old fashioned "let's kill the indigenous for the crime of being here when we invaded" yarn, but those are extremely rare now that empire-building is seen as a mostly negative thing.

Little Big Man is a pretty good example (haven't actually seen it), and I don't know what happens in Run of the Arrow, but we're not talking about just going native or making a friend out of an enemy. We're talking about actively "betraying your race". That's the DwW/Fern Gully/Last Samurai/Avatar story.

For the record, I think it's fine to retell a familiar story, as long as you do a good job. I thought Avatar was a horrible, paint-by-numbers mess, whereas all three Toy Story films are well made.

Also, my favorite part of Never Cry Wolf was when Liam Neeson showed up and killed all the wolves. That guy is awesome.

Last edited by Zarban (2013-01-31 00:53:26)

Well, I personally have betrayed my race, but I mean the movies Squiggly cited were specifically "betray your race" type.

Run of the Arrow is clearly presaging that, tho, so it's a great example, but I'm guessing Rod Steiger doesn't abandon his military post or kill a white man.

I'm willing to pay off my bet on Little Big Man, tho. I think he actually betrays Custer.

/small bills or bucket of quarters, Trey?

Well, he does and he doesn't - and the way he does it is my favorite moment in that movie.  It's maybe a special case.

But in general, yeah - Hoffman's character starts as a white guy, goes native, then sorrrta helps the natives defeat Custer at the Little Big Horn...

RE: the topic -

No. Next question.

I watched it. i agree with some stuff, I disagree with others.

My general view on TS3 is that it's... alright. It has it's moments, and it's wraps up the series well enough. But it's definitely not worth the praise it's gotten. I never did understand the massive windfall of adoration it got, it just kinda felt like another decently made animated movie. So it definitely doesn't /suck/ but it's also not amazing.

I like the reference to Rango he made, I didn't get around to Rango until a couple months ago, and it's easily on my short list of best animated movies ever. It just has this weird matureness and willingness to not talk down to the audience that you don't see in those kinds of movies these days.

Last edited by BigDamnArtist (2013-01-31 04:30:40)

White's one of the few true cultural critics in a sea of entertainment writers crusading for that valuable ground between the vapid assessment of a work as "good" or "bad".

While White has insane opinions, if you listen to the man talk (check out some of his discussions on the slashfilmcast), its clear that A. he truly believes this stuff, and B. He's an extremely knowledgeable and well-versed film critic, who knows his shit. The guy is really interesting to read because he'll offer a reading or viewpoint on a film that you are not going to get anywhere else. Most of the time I think his viewpoint is wrong, but even when I disagree, his reviews often highlight an aspect of a movie that I overlooked, or put it in an interesting or original context. And other times, he completely gets it right, like his infamous Precious review calling it an awful, racist movie that promotes negative stereotypes of minorities.
(http://nypress.com/pride-precious/)

He does what so few film critics care about anymore, instead of just saying whether a movie is good or bad and trotting out the same points as every other goddamn review out there, he writes something that will inspire discussion.

Last edited by bullet3 (2013-01-31 08:35:36)

Armond White is a cultural critic in the same way as the raving homeless guy screaming about the gubmint on a street corner is a political pundit.

EDIT: Although, given the state of political punditry, maybe that's a bad analogy since the homeless guy actually is on about the same level.

Last edited by Dorkman (2013-01-31 09:35:35)

He's Gandalf's italian, alcoholic cousin.

(actually I have no idea)

I hadn't paid attention to Armond White until this past hour, which I've spent reading several of his reviews (starting with Precious - thanks Bullet - and on to Django and others) and his Wiki article.

Well. Now I know. Alrighty.

I have to admit, his ability to remark upon an insight is impressive. How insightful he actually is is something I have yet to sort out, I'd need a lot more context, but he described Samuel L. Jackson's role in Django as atavistic, an analogy that, frankly, dazzled me.

I'm certainly not on team White over here, I'm not throwing him under the bus... honestly, as of right now, I find him to be an interesting case. (And now I'm super curious about what I'd find in his book.)

I suddenly imagine a documentary juxtaposing Ebert and White. Between this and that "The Empire Strikes Back Sucked" clip the other day, the proper intention of film criticism has been on my mind lately, and I wonder how much of my preference for one style is simply ignorance of the other.