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Mr. Green
Joined: 23 Feb 2007
Posts: 1394
Location: Calgary
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| Posted: Mon Apr 26, 2010 7:27 pm Post subject: |
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Curt, go to Future shop. They had piles of them at the front door. They were on sale until yesterday.
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Sparky015
Joined: 12 May 2009
Posts: 1185
Location: Cleveland / Akron, OH
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| Posted: Mon Apr 26, 2010 7:39 pm Post subject: |
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| Mr. Green wrote: | | Mark_A_W wrote: | | emdawgz1 wrote: |
Nope. I haven't seen it.
But then i still have Iron Man, sitting downstairs on my B/R player unwatched... I've never seen that either.  |
Ironman is crap. Don't bother.
It's just chest beating propaganda. |
Really? I quite enjoyed Iron man. I've watched it a few times now. It's not as annoying as the Spiderman trilogy. I liked Robert Downey in it. It's similar to all superhero movies, so don't expect much more than comic book writing/ dialogue, so if you aren't expecting a masterpiece and just a good action flick, it's good. |
From an engineer's perspective ( I wish something could go from proto to finished product that fast) I thought Ironman was awesome. I wished he would have kicked A a little more than he did, but overall, I thought it was a great movie. Well worth buying. I look forward to Ironman II.
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emdawgz1
Joined: 14 Mar 2006
Posts: 7949
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| Posted: Mon Apr 26, 2010 8:02 pm Post subject: |
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| Mr. Green wrote: |
Really? I quite enjoyed Iron man. I've watched it a few times now. It's not as annoying as the Spiderman trilogy. I liked Robert Downey in it. It's similar to all superhero movies, so don't expect much more than comic book writing/ dialogue, so if you aren't expecting a masterpiece and just a good action flick, it's good. |
Ummmm EXCUSE ME??????
I think some of the best writing around is Comic book writing. Chris Claremont is a genius!!! If the studio had stuck closer to his story arc in "Days of future past" The X-men movies wouldnt have SUCKED so much. Ditto for the Spiderman films.
Even today, Look at Matt Fraction's Thor episodes... or The Marvel Civil War arc by Mark Millar, or Secret Invasion by Brian M. Bendis.
This writing is better than most of the Schlock coming out of hollywood today.
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emdawgz1
Joined: 14 Mar 2006
Posts: 7949
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| Posted: Mon Apr 26, 2010 8:05 pm Post subject: |
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BTW part of my Iron Man reticence is the fact that i Fricking HATE TONY STARK!!!!
Hated him in the 80's and his role in the CW/ SA only added to my poor opinion.
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Sparky015
Joined: 12 May 2009
Posts: 1185
Location: Cleveland / Akron, OH
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| Posted: Mon Apr 26, 2010 8:35 pm Post subject: |
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Yeah, I can see that. I looked past the Tony Stark thing and looked for the Iron Man character for the action. I didn't like that part of it either. You have to like a flick that starts immediately with an AC/DC song though! 
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Mr. Green
Joined: 23 Feb 2007
Posts: 1394
Location: Calgary
TV/Projector: Marquee 9501LC / NEC 9PG+
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| Posted: Mon Apr 26, 2010 8:59 pm Post subject: |
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| emdawgz1 wrote: | | Mr. Green wrote: |
Really? I quite enjoyed Iron man. I've watched it a few times now. It's not as annoying as the Spiderman trilogy. I liked Robert Downey in it. It's similar to all superhero movies, so don't expect much more than comic book writing/ dialogue, so if you aren't expecting a masterpiece and just a good action flick, it's good. |
Ummmm EXCUSE ME??????
I think some of the best writing around is Comic book writing. Chris Claremont is a genius!!! If the studio had stuck closer to his story arc in "Days of future past" The X-men movies wouldnt have SUCKED so much. Ditto for the Spiderman films.
Even today, Look at Matt Fraction's Thor episodes... or The Marvel Civil War arc by Mark Millar, or Secret Invasion by Brian M. Bendis.
This writing is better than most of the Schlock coming out of hollywood today. |
Sorry Em, I wasn't trying to say Comic book writing sucks, more that the writing when translating comics to movies sucks. Looking at that, I didn't make my point very well. It's just like watching them butcher your favorite book when they make it into a movie.
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kal
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Joined: 06 Mar 2006
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Location: Ottawa, Canada
TV/Projector: JVC DLA-NZ7
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| Posted: Mon Apr 26, 2010 9:21 pm Post subject: |
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I really enjoyed this review of Avatar. It's exactly how I feel about it too. Here's a quote:
| Quote: | Reviewed by Joshua Zyber
Monday, April 26, 2010
The Movie Itself: Our Reviewer's Take
"I see you."
Let's say that you're a successful filmmaker with a pretty good track record for directing blockbuster hits. Your last feature was, at the time, the most expensive motion picture ever produced. Early buzz predicted it to be a financial failure, but you defied the naysayers. Somehow, you managed to tap into the cultural zeitgeist at just the right moment. Not only did that movie become the biggest box office hit of all time (by wide margin), it also went on to be nominated for and win a bunch of major prestigious awards. Anxiety has got to set in at that point. How can anyone top an achievement like that? Well, if you're James Cameron, you spend the next dozen years putzing around, biding your time, and maybe directing the occasional IMAX documentary just to give yourself something to do. Then, when the moment is right, you go out and do the exact same thing all over again.
Almost as if to make the challenge more difficult for himself, Cameron did it this time with a nearly-unmarketable concept, no major stars to back him, and the worst script he's ever written. How the hell did he pull this off? I can't figure it out.
'Avatar' has thus far earned about $887 trillion at the box office. Odds are, you've probably already seen the film, perhaps a few times. Or, you didn't see it, in which case you probably don't have much interest in it in the first place. In either case, I'll try to keep the plot recap short.
In the late 19th Century, a Civil War soldier who's been injured in battle accepts a posting to a remote outpost in the untamed Western frontier, hoping to "find himself." He soon meets and becomes ingratiated with a tribe of Native American Indians. He's so enamored by the natives that he falls in love with one of their women and abandons his military career. He must learn the tribe's language, must undergo its rituals, and must survive a dangerous test of courage by hunting buffalo. He's not only accepted into the tribe, but soon proves himself to be its very best warrior. He quickly becomes its leader, and must use his superior white man skills to defend the helpless natives from his former military colleagues, who have gone mad with greed and are trying to drive the natives out of their land.
Oh, wait a minute. I'm sorry, that's the plot of Kevin Costner's 1990 Oscar winner and blockbuster hit 'Dances with Wolves'. What was I thinking? Let me try this again.
In the distant future, a space marine who's been injured in battle accepts a posting to a remote outpost on the untamed alien moon of Pandora, hoping to "find himself." He soon meets and becomes ingratiated with a tribe of blue Thundercats called the Na'vi who look, dress, and act suspiciously just like Native American Indians. He's so enamored by the natives that he falls in love with one of their women and abandons his military career. He must learn the tribe's language, must undergo its rituals, and must survive a dangerous test of courage by riding a dragon. He's not only accepted into the tribe, but soon proves himself to be its very best warrior. He quickly becomes its leader, and must use his superior white man skills to defend the helpless natives from his former military colleagues, who have gone mad with greed and are trying to drive the natives out of their land.
I think I now see where I got confused. It's as if Cameron dug up a copy of the 'Wolves' script and did a simple Find/Replace on character and other proper names.
When I was 16, I thought that 'Dances with Wolves' was the best movie I'd ever seen. When I was 25, I watched it again and was greatly disenchanted with it. When I was 30, I tried it one more time, hoping to recapture my original enthusiasm, and found myself embarrassed for ever having liked it. In my younger days, I simply didn't have the experience, the perspective, or frankly the taste to recognize how didactic and simplistic the movie was. 'Avatar' takes those failings, and copies them note-for-note exactly the same without recognition or improvement. Painting the Indians blue and showing them to us in 3-D can't fix the fundamental flaws in the story that were there all along.
Like 'Dances with Wolves' (and its other clones such as 'The Last Samurai' or Disney's animated 'Pocahontas'), 'Avatar' is a ridiculous Liberal Guilt fantasy. It's a movie made by a wealthy and powerful white man who wants to apologize for the actions of his ancestors – actions that in fact directly allowed him to become so wealthy and powerful. He's concocted a silly fantasy where a heroic white man (his narrative avatar) can save the poor helpless Noble Savages who aren't capable of taking care of themselves. The whole point of this fantasy is to assuage his own feelings of guilt and present himself as the hero. What he doesn't realize is just how condescending and insulting that fantasy is.
Further, misguided political correctness is far from the only thing wrong with 'Avatar'. For all the technological marvel of Cameron shooting the movie in 3-D, the characters in his script are embarrassingly one-dimensional. The villains are cartoonishly over-the-top, and act completely without motivation. Giovanni Ribisi's pencil-pushing administrator Douchebag McSelfish (yes, that's actually his name; look it up) lacks only a mustache to twirl as he plots his diabolical scheme to bulldoze over the sacred Na'vi Life Tree and slaughter all the gentle villagers there. It seems that the village sits on top of a big deposit of some mineral ore called "Unobtainium." (OK, I may have been joking before. But this one's real. Honest.) Why? Well, we're told that Unobtainium is valuable. That's it. Why is it valuable? Is it really worth committing genocide over? These are questions never addressed.
Next we have Stephen Lang as Col. Snarly Evilpants. He's evil just for the sake of being evil. You can tell because he has a scar on his face. That makes him a villain. (Those of us who remember Lang as the pudgy tabloid reporter Freddy Lounds in 'Manhunter' may find him unrecognizable here.) The humans on Pandora have been mining the Unobtainium for decades, and continue to mine it from other parts of the moon. Nevertheless, just as they get a man on the inside in a position to negotiate with the Na'vi, Evilpants decides that he needs to make his move against them right then. Why? Because he's tired of waiting, dammit! And he hasn't killed anybody in almost a whole day. Bwaa haa haaa!!
Our protagonist Bland Heroman (Sam Worthington) is barely more developed. One huge problem with the story is that there's no dilemma for him. The villains are so over-the-top evil, and the Na'vi are so ridiculously good and pure and wonderful, that there's no real conflict. There's no decision he has to make. Of course he's going to join the Na'vi. Why wouldn't he? What other decision could there possibly be? The story would be better served if the hero had to face up to a moral dilemma.
We're only told that the villains want the Unobtainium because it's valuable. It's easy to root against a character whose sole trait is greed. Suppose instead that the Unobtainium were not only valuable, but also vital to the survival of the human race. Then Bland would have to make a decision. Is protecting the Na'vi more important than the extinction of his own race? That's something to chew over, and would not have been difficult to incorporate into the script.
Suppose also that the Na'vi weren't so angelic and perfect and saintly, and weren't such physically appealing humanoids. What if they had a more realistic mix of positive qualities, negative qualities, and just "alien" qualities that the hero doesn't understand at first? That would make his decision much harder, and ultimately worthwhile. Compare 'Avatar' to 'District 9'. In the latter, the hero loves his old life. He doesn't want to join the aliens. He thinks they're dirty and disgusting and vile. When he starts to turn into one, he desperately wants to go back. Over the course of the movie, he's forced to confront his prejudices and beliefs, and to see the aliens in a much more complex understanding. He finally recognizes that what he himself had been doing to them was wrong. Only then does he make the decision to do the right thing. Because he knows that he has to, despite initially not wanting to. That's a much richer and more rewarding character journey. And the director carries us through that arc with almost a full hour less time than Cameron wasted on 'Avatar'. Yet the movie still has plenty of action, excitement, CG eye candy, and sci-fi thrills.
With all that said, how is it that 'Avatar' became such a broadly appealing crossover hit with audiences from all walks of life? Were viewers really that enchanted by Smurfy blue Indians who ride dragons in a magical rainforest? Or was it just the 3-D? In my opinion, that was a big part of it. Cameron didn't just shoot the movie in 3-D, he rethought the way that 3-D had ever been used in the past. He developed new equipment and new shooting techniques to minimize the gimmicky "Comin' at ya!" gags. Instead, he emphasized the immersive depth of the image. Although now in 2010, we're starting to see the rollout of 3-D HDTVs, 'Avatar' was perfectly timed to give audiences a theatrical experience they couldn't get at home on a television. Viewers who would normally wait to see a movie like this on DVD or Blu-ray made a point to see 'Avatar' in theaters. And many of them went back to see it again before its theatrical window closed.
Just as importantly, Cameron finally found a way to overcome that "Uncanny Valley" effect that has up to now prevented fully-CG characters from ever quite achieving photorealism. Mostly, it's in the eyes. Look into the eyes of the rubbery automatons of 'The Polar Express' and you can see that they have no soul. The Na'vi of 'Avatar', on the other hand, are thoroughly convincing as real, living beings, both on their own and in their interactions with live actors. That's a huge achievement.
The environment of Pandora is also a beautiful thing to behold. Much of it is derivative of countless fantasy novels, RPG video games, and anime, of course. But the way Cameron presents it is pretty wondrous. From the luminescent colors of the foliage to the tiniest alien details strewn throughout every frame, even deep into the far background, this is clearly a world that its creator has put enormous thought and planning into.
And, it must be said, it's nice to finally be back in the hands of an action movie master of James Cameron's caliber. The flawless, virtuoso choreography of his action sequences provide much-needed relief from the irritating Shaky Cam fad that has taken over Hollywood in recent years. This is how a real filmmaker shoots an action scene.
All of which just makes the movie's reliance on such a lousy script that much more disappointing. Imagine what 'Avatar' could have been with a decent story and multi-dimensional characters. It could have been a masterpiece. Instead, 'Avatar' is just a very pretty visual spectacle with a lot of whiz-bang, state-of-the-art special effects. That shine won't last forever. I guarantee you that in no more than five years' time, other filmmakers will have built off and improved Cameron's breakthroughs to such an extent that 'Avatar' will look downright clunky and primitive. (Even now, for long stretches of the picture, you must accept that you're watching an animated film, with little live action in sight.) The best movies use their advances in technology to serve the benefits of a good story. The technology in itself cannot make a movie good, without a strong story to back it up. James Cameron has apparently forgotten this lesson, and allowed himself to get lost in his fantasy concoction.
But, you know what they say. You can't spell "Naive" without Na'vi. *
[* Credit where it's due, I believe that this phrase was first coined by my friend, Toronto film critic Norm Wilner. But it's just so good that I couldn't resist using it. I hope Norm will forgive me.] |
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Mark_A_W
Joined: 15 Mar 2006
Posts: 3068
Location: Sunny Melbourne Australia
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| Posted: Mon Apr 26, 2010 9:27 pm Post subject: |
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| Curt Palme wrote: | | 3D doesn't work for me I'm afraid. I've had a lazy left eye since birth, and it's only used about 20% of the time. No 3D system, regardless of which one it is has ever worked for me. |
Can't you get that fixed?
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garyfritz
Joined: 08 Apr 2006
Posts: 12088
Location: Fort Collins, CO
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| Posted: Mon Apr 26, 2010 11:37 pm Post subject: |
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You can get it surgically ""fixed."" They cut muscles around your eye to make it harder for your eye to cross. My wife had that surgery as a child.
Unfortunately it's a cosmetic "fix." You don't look like your eye is crossing any more, but your brain hasn't learned how to use both eyes together. Virtually all people who get the surgery never have proper depth perception in real life, let alone with 3D gimmicks.
My son had the same problem -- it's hereditary. We refused the surgery and took him to several years of vision therapy. His eye will still cross if he takes his glasses off, especially if he's tired -- but he has perfectly normal depth perception with his glasses on.
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Mark_A_W
Joined: 15 Mar 2006
Posts: 3068
Location: Sunny Melbourne Australia
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| Posted: Mon Apr 26, 2010 11:43 pm Post subject: |
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Cursed new fangled gimmicks...
Like the Talkies, or Colour, or Panavision/Cinemascope, or Dolby Surround/Digital sound....or even Digital Cinema projector (which spank film)...
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AnalogRocks
Forum Moderator
Joined: 08 Mar 2006
Posts: 26706
Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
TV/Projector: Sony 1252Q, AMPRO 4000G
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| Posted: Mon Apr 26, 2010 11:46 pm Post subject: |
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| Mark_A_W wrote: | Cursed new fangled gimmicks...
Like the Talkies, or Colour, or Panavision/Cinemascope, or Dolby Surround/Digital sound....or even Digital Cinema projector (which spank film)... |
Nope nope nope 
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betel
Joined: 20 Apr 2006
Posts: 448
Location: Maryville, Tennessee (Just South of Knoxville)
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| Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2010 1:41 am Post subject: |
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"'Avatar' has thus far earned about $887 trillion at the box office."
Maybe Cameron will loan the US a few of those trillion! I'm sure Obama could use it to create a few more entitlement programs.
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Mark_A_W
Joined: 15 Mar 2006
Posts: 3068
Location: Sunny Melbourne Australia
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| Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2010 1:45 am Post subject: |
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| AnalogRocks wrote: | | Mark_A_W wrote: | Cursed new fangled gimmicks...
Like the Talkies, or Colour, or Panavision/Cinemascope, or Dolby Surround/Digital sound....or even Digital Cinema projector (which spank film)... |
Nope nope nope |
You are kidding me right?
I went to see Dragon 3D on the weekend, a group freebie. Took my 3D glasses along in eager anticipation...
Turns out it was a 2D showing - I was spewing.
And, as per EVERY OTHER 35mm film presentation I have seen, it was blurry, it was washed out, it flickered. It looked like an AC CRT showing a DVD at 48hz. CRAP.
Unlike Avatar, which 3D aside, was SHARP, black was the best I've ever seen, and it had such POP to the image.
Digital Cinema projectors SPANK 35mm film - at least all the 35mm film I've ever seen (only seen it at the multiplex).
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MikeEby
Joined: 24 Jun 2007
Posts: 5237
Location: Osceola, Indiana
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| Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2010 1:56 am Post subject: |
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I haven't been to a commercial theater since 1997.
So I will reserve judgment on digital cinema.
Mike
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AnalogRocks
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Joined: 08 Mar 2006
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Location: Toronto, Ontario, Canada
TV/Projector: Sony 1252Q, AMPRO 4000G
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| Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2010 5:09 am Post subject: |
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| Mark_A_W wrote: | | AnalogRocks wrote: | | Mark_A_W wrote: | Cursed new fangled gimmicks...
Like the Talkies, or Colour, or Panavision/Cinemascope, or Dolby Surround/Digital sound....or even Digital Cinema projector (which spank film)... |
Nope nope nope |
You are kidding me right?
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Nope nope nope.
I've seen the digital projectors. Horrible, big pixels crappy horrible got my money back!
I got to the movies to watch a film. Not a video projector!
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Mark_A_W
Joined: 15 Mar 2006
Posts: 3068
Location: Sunny Melbourne Australia
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| Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2010 5:19 am Post subject: |
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You saw a very different digital cinema projector to me.
The only fault I could see, was the black level was still not perfect. But there are exit lights and aisle lights - it can never be black.
No pixels whatsoever. No dithered blacks. No washed out midlevel scenes. No flicker.
Very, very sharp. The credits were like my Plasma on Bluray. Bright enough to have HEAPS of pop, even with the glasses on.
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Tom.W
Joined: 09 Mar 2006
Posts: 6635
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| Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2010 5:36 am Post subject: |
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[quote="betel"]"'Avatar' has thus far earned about $887 trillion at the box office."
Maybe Cameron will loan the US a few of those trillion! I'm sure Obama could use it to create a few more entitlement programs.[/quote
You might want to double check those numbers ... 
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Mark_A_W
Joined: 15 Mar 2006
Posts: 3068
Location: Sunny Melbourne Australia
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| Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2010 5:48 am Post subject: |
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Please Tom, don't let a pesky 6 orders of magnitude get in the way of a good partisan rant!
What's the GDP of the world anyway? 50-60 Trillion?
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TheVerge
Joined: 19 Jul 2009
Posts: 928
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| Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2010 2:51 pm Post subject: |
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I 100% agree, i thought the movie was crap... but man was it nice watching those 3d pictures.
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ecrabb
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| Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2010 4:31 pm Post subject: |
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| Mark_A_W wrote: | Ironman is crap. Don't bother.
It's just chest beating propaganda. |
Wow, so Avatar - a total Xerox copy of at least two other scripts and an über-liberal anti-corporate, anti-business, anti-white man propaganda piece and you write about it like it's the best movie you've ever seen.
But, Ironman is crap - and is just chest-beating propaganda.
Hilarious!
SC
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