Sunday, February 3, 2013
Where My Time Has Gone
Well, hi! There are two things in this world that I love: Movies, and Disney. And one thing I've discovered is that I'm much better about writing about all things Disney than I am at writing about movies. With that being said, if you've stumbled upon this blog and realized it rarely gets updated, please, go visit my other blog, Mickey Mutineers! It gets updated multiple times a week by me and my brothers! And there's a podcast to go along with it! I'm sure I'll be back to this blog eventually, but for now, it's on hiatus. Go check out the other one, and have a great day!
Friday, November 2, 2012
DISNEY BUYS LUCASFILM
Tuesday, October 30, 2012, I felt a disturbance in the Force. It was as if thousand of fan boys cried out in pain and were suddenly silenced. The headlines were out! Disney Buys LucasFilm! Episodes 7-9 have release dates! Well, the fan boys shouldn't have cried out. This is glorious news! Here are some reasons why:
-Over the last few years, Disney has proven that they excel at buying outside companies and then letting those acquired companies run themselves to great success. Examples? Pixar, Muppets, Marvel. So far so good there.
-You know who SHOULDN'T be making new Star Wars movies? George Lucas. Let's face it. Lucas is a great innovator and a visionary mind of the likes this world has rarely seen. But he's a crap director. I know the Star Wars prequels get a lot of flack (even though only episode 1 was the only truly bad one), but Lucas directed them to sub-par quality. The new movies will be based off of Lucas's treatments with someone else directing. You know what other Star Wars movies were made like that? The best ones!
-All the great directors currently making movies were kids that grew up with Star Wars as a major influence. Christopher Nolan, Brad Bird, J.J. Abrams, Joss Whedon, and countless others are now in the running to actually make their own Star Wars movie! Although, whoever wins that spot is going to be under some serious pressure to redeem the franchise from the bad taste the prequels left in the public's mouth.
-What happens after Return of the Jedi?? Galactic empires don't just fall because another Death Star gets destroyed and a bunch of adorable walking teddy bears takes out a small regime of troops...and you kill the emperor... There had to have been a contingency plan!
-I know this is a movie blog, so I'll just touch on this one: imagine the theme park possibilities! A whole Star Wars land? A whole Star Wars park? Let's wait and see together!
So far, things are looking good for the franchise. And people shouldn't be quick to call foul on a fantastic opportunity.
-Over the last few years, Disney has proven that they excel at buying outside companies and then letting those acquired companies run themselves to great success. Examples? Pixar, Muppets, Marvel. So far so good there.
-You know who SHOULDN'T be making new Star Wars movies? George Lucas. Let's face it. Lucas is a great innovator and a visionary mind of the likes this world has rarely seen. But he's a crap director. I know the Star Wars prequels get a lot of flack (even though only episode 1 was the only truly bad one), but Lucas directed them to sub-par quality. The new movies will be based off of Lucas's treatments with someone else directing. You know what other Star Wars movies were made like that? The best ones!
-All the great directors currently making movies were kids that grew up with Star Wars as a major influence. Christopher Nolan, Brad Bird, J.J. Abrams, Joss Whedon, and countless others are now in the running to actually make their own Star Wars movie! Although, whoever wins that spot is going to be under some serious pressure to redeem the franchise from the bad taste the prequels left in the public's mouth.
-What happens after Return of the Jedi?? Galactic empires don't just fall because another Death Star gets destroyed and a bunch of adorable walking teddy bears takes out a small regime of troops...and you kill the emperor... There had to have been a contingency plan!
-I know this is a movie blog, so I'll just touch on this one: imagine the theme park possibilities! A whole Star Wars land? A whole Star Wars park? Let's wait and see together!
So far, things are looking good for the franchise. And people shouldn't be quick to call foul on a fantastic opportunity.
Tuesday, September 25, 2012
The Pixar Epiphany
The studio that can mostly do no wrong! PIXAR! We all know it. We all love it! And we all notice the little easter eggs hidden throughout every movie. The Pizza Planet truck. The ball with a star on it. Recurring background characters. We all thought these were just clever in-jokes by Pixar's animators, right? Well I had a thought. Maybe they're not in-jokes. Maybe all these recurring things pop up because every Pixar movie takes place within the same collective universe! Don't question it! Just follow me. Here we go in chronological order!
1. Brave. The witch clearly has some magical power that let's her see into the future. That's why she has a wood carving of the Pizza Planet truck and a wooden plaque of Sully from Monster's Inc. Ok, moving on.
2. The Incredibles. Set sometime in the 20th century. Judging from the car models and styles of everything, I would say sometime in the 70's or 80's. Pizza Planet also hasn't been created yet. This is also the only Pixar movie without the truck we all know and love.
3-10. Toy Story 1,2, and 3, Bug's Life, Monsters Inc., Finding Nemo, Ratatouille, and Up all take place around the same time period. Buzz chops Heimlich (the caterpillar from Bug's Life) off a branch in Toy Story 2. Randal from Monsters Inc. ends up at the trailer that is also the home of Bug City in Bug's Life. There are many other examples, but you can see how these films are intertwined.
Here's where we take a dark turn.
11. Wall-E. Humans have wasted the Earth and it's time to move on. We employ a whole host of very advanced robots to serve us and clean up our mess here on Earth while we're gone. After 500-something years in space, we humans have become fat, worthless blobs. And the robots seem to have gotten smarter. According to the ship's computer, they also have a complete history and memory of past life on earth. At the end of the movie, the humans come back to Earth and seem to be thriving.
And now a darker turn. This hasn't been shown in any Pixar movie, but countless other movies have shown us that when we start to rely on robots, they realize that they don't need us anymore. Sometime after the events of Wall-E, the robots turn on the humans and eradicate every last one of us. Which brings us to the final two movies.
12. Cars 1 and 2. After the robots take out the human race, they try to start over and carry on the human way of life, but without us. They use the Axiom's memory from Wall-E and rebuild to the way things were. They build themselves into cars and planes, start cities, build freeways. Everything in life we had. Except our existence. And the robots, who are now cars, flourish.
And that's why secretly a lot of people found the Cars movies to be creepy and soulless.
1. Brave. The witch clearly has some magical power that let's her see into the future. That's why she has a wood carving of the Pizza Planet truck and a wooden plaque of Sully from Monster's Inc. Ok, moving on.
2. The Incredibles. Set sometime in the 20th century. Judging from the car models and styles of everything, I would say sometime in the 70's or 80's. Pizza Planet also hasn't been created yet. This is also the only Pixar movie without the truck we all know and love.
3-10. Toy Story 1,2, and 3, Bug's Life, Monsters Inc., Finding Nemo, Ratatouille, and Up all take place around the same time period. Buzz chops Heimlich (the caterpillar from Bug's Life) off a branch in Toy Story 2. Randal from Monsters Inc. ends up at the trailer that is also the home of Bug City in Bug's Life. There are many other examples, but you can see how these films are intertwined.
Here's where we take a dark turn.
11. Wall-E. Humans have wasted the Earth and it's time to move on. We employ a whole host of very advanced robots to serve us and clean up our mess here on Earth while we're gone. After 500-something years in space, we humans have become fat, worthless blobs. And the robots seem to have gotten smarter. According to the ship's computer, they also have a complete history and memory of past life on earth. At the end of the movie, the humans come back to Earth and seem to be thriving.
And now a darker turn. This hasn't been shown in any Pixar movie, but countless other movies have shown us that when we start to rely on robots, they realize that they don't need us anymore. Sometime after the events of Wall-E, the robots turn on the humans and eradicate every last one of us. Which brings us to the final two movies.
12. Cars 1 and 2. After the robots take out the human race, they try to start over and carry on the human way of life, but without us. They use the Axiom's memory from Wall-E and rebuild to the way things were. They build themselves into cars and planes, start cities, build freeways. Everything in life we had. Except our existence. And the robots, who are now cars, flourish.
And that's why secretly a lot of people found the Cars movies to be creepy and soulless.
Thursday, July 12, 2012
My Problem With Star Wars Problems: Episode 1
There's a disgusting trend going on lately about Star Wars nerds whining and boobing about how George Lucas ruined their lives, his movies, the natural world, etc. I have a lot of problems with this on both sides, so this will most likely be a running series. To start things off, I'm going to tackle the big one, the mother of all Star Wars fallacies:
DID HAN SHOOT FIRST?!
When the first Star Wars movie first came out, in the cantina scene when Greedo approaches Han to collect on a bounty, it appears that Han shoots Greedo in cold blood. When the special editions came out in 1997, suddenly Greedo shoots at Han a split second before, missing Han's head, and then gets dealt his dying blow. Some people are fine with this. Most people are against it. I think there's a bigger issue here.
Greedo is a bounty hunter! His whole life revolves around killing/taking/kidnapping anyone and everyone for a profit if the price is right. How in the world does he miss Han's face with a laser blaster from three feet away? What kind of piss-poor bounty hunter is he? Has he ever got his target? Han blasts him from under the table without even aiming, and he's just a smuggler.
The Issue: Did Han shoot first?
The Answer: Who cares! Why is Greedo such a poor shot in a profession that requires a solid shot?
DID HAN SHOOT FIRST?!
When the first Star Wars movie first came out, in the cantina scene when Greedo approaches Han to collect on a bounty, it appears that Han shoots Greedo in cold blood. When the special editions came out in 1997, suddenly Greedo shoots at Han a split second before, missing Han's head, and then gets dealt his dying blow. Some people are fine with this. Most people are against it. I think there's a bigger issue here.
Greedo is a bounty hunter! His whole life revolves around killing/taking/kidnapping anyone and everyone for a profit if the price is right. How in the world does he miss Han's face with a laser blaster from three feet away? What kind of piss-poor bounty hunter is he? Has he ever got his target? Han blasts him from under the table without even aiming, and he's just a smuggler.
The Issue: Did Han shoot first?
The Answer: Who cares! Why is Greedo such a poor shot in a profession that requires a solid shot?
Wednesday, June 27, 2012
How to enjoy Prometheus
Watch the movie up to the point where Charlize Theron awkwardly proclaims "...father!" Then leave the theater, because you've seen the best parts, and any questions you've had up until then won't be answered anyway. You'll just have more questions.
Then go home and look up the very last scene. That was pretty cool.
Then go home and look up the very last scene. That was pretty cool.
CGI
Ah, good ol' CGI. Computer Generated Imagery, it's such a gift, and yet such a curse. It has been lightly used in movies dating back to the 60's, but the first time it looked realistic on a large scale was in 1993 in a little film called Jurassic Park. And here's my problem: Tron used computer effects in 1982, and at the time I'm sure it looked really great. Mind blowing, even. I don't know, I wasn't around yet. What I do know is looking at the original Tron now, it looks like crap. Neat, nostalgic crap. But still crap. Fast forward eleven years and Mr. Spielberg is working on his dinosaur movie. He was almost sold on using a stop-motion technique for the dinosaurs called go-motion, or something like that. It doesn't matter because when someone suggested using CGI on the dinosaurs, go-motion was instantly obsolete. Or extinct. That's right, the dinosaurs in Jurassic Park almost looked like the skeletons in Jason and the Argonauts!
Backing up a bit, we can agree that watching Tron today looks like crap. I can't stress this enough. But have you watched Jurassic Park lately? It's almost 19 years old and the CGI STILL HOLDS UP! The dinosaurs look like dinosaurs! They seamlessly blend from CGI to full size animatronic and it looks great! So what's my problem? According to the Laws of Ways I Think The World Should Work, every CGI image since Jurassic Park should look better or at least equal to the creatures in Jurassic Park. I put that in bold because I'm just that pompous. Don't believe me? Go back and watch Spider-Man 1 and 2, (avoid 3 at all costs.) They are still really good movies, but Spidey swinging through the cities and beating up the baddies just isn't holding up anymore. It's falling into Tron territory, except it lacks that so-bad-it's-good fun. But it should look better than Jurassic Park! But it doesn't. Why? I don't know. I'll leave that open to you, and now when you see bad CGI, you'll ask yourself the same.
Backing up a bit, we can agree that watching Tron today looks like crap. I can't stress this enough. But have you watched Jurassic Park lately? It's almost 19 years old and the CGI STILL HOLDS UP! The dinosaurs look like dinosaurs! They seamlessly blend from CGI to full size animatronic and it looks great! So what's my problem? According to the Laws of Ways I Think The World Should Work, every CGI image since Jurassic Park should look better or at least equal to the creatures in Jurassic Park. I put that in bold because I'm just that pompous. Don't believe me? Go back and watch Spider-Man 1 and 2, (avoid 3 at all costs.) They are still really good movies, but Spidey swinging through the cities and beating up the baddies just isn't holding up anymore. It's falling into Tron territory, except it lacks that so-bad-it's-good fun. But it should look better than Jurassic Park! But it doesn't. Why? I don't know. I'll leave that open to you, and now when you see bad CGI, you'll ask yourself the same.
Thursday, May 24, 2012
Drive
Drive is a movie I've been meaning to watch but never got around to, until it came up on my Netflix account as a recommended title. Directed by Nicolas Winding Refn and starring Ryan Gosling and Carey Mulligan, I'm going to categorize this movie as "Good movie, happy I saw it, never really want to see it again." Maybe I'm not as into art house movies as I think I am, but there were a few things in here that just brought the movie down a few notches for me.
First, and most importantly, the long awkward silences. If you've seen this movie, you know what I'm talking about. Ryan Gosling's character, the Driver, and Carey Mulligan's character spend a lot of time together where not a freaking word is said! At first the scenes come off as sweet, as they stare longingly into each other's eyes. Then three minutes pass by and they're still doing it! Why? Why?! Let me just say that if I tried this on a girl, just staring at her for extended periods of time, cops would be called, and then I'd be spending the night with some guy in a striped jump suit. The scenes are fine at first, but they just go too long. Creepy too long. The movie clocks in at 100 minutes. If you trimmed most of these long silences, you could easily get this movie down to 80 or so minutes.
The other problem I had was with the car chases. Now hear me out, because the car chases were awesome! There was no music at all over the scene, and this for some reason adds a heightened sense of urgency. (For more scenes intense scenes with no soundtrack, see Children of Men.) The problem I had was with the first car chase, cops were everywhere. Even an LAPD helicopter jumped in on the action. The second chase scene covered many miles in broad daylight, and not a cop to be found. In Los Angeles and the surrounding valley. Daylight. No cops. Los Angeles. Really?
Those are really my biggest gripes. Again, I liked the movie a lot. It was briefly super violent, and the violence comes out of nowhere, so buckle up for that. I can recommend this movie, I'm glad I saw it, but there's really no need for repeat viewings. I got it covered on this one.
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