What Movies Are We Watching: The Flickening.

[garhkal]

Saw Earth to Echo last night.  What the heck is it with holly wood and all these 'shakey cam, follow you around with a camera films' these days??

If it wasn't for that and a few BIG spastyc moments imo, it would have been a much more decent film.  As is it was at least a 2 on the 5 star scale.

[Banzai]

Saw Earth to Echo last night.  What the heck is it with holly wood and all these 'shakey cam, follow you around with a camera films' these days??  /snip/

Dude, SteadiCam is expensive!  There is only so much a small studio like Walt Disney can do for $13 million dollars.  Sheesh.   

(Actually I made a DIY movement stabilizer rig for my camera for $10 that works really well.  Heh.)

[MoneyLovinOgre4Hire]

"Shawn of the Dead" and "Zombieland" were both enjoyable. If you enjoy Simon Pegg, and haven't seen it, I definitely recommend "Hot Fuzz." ("Yarp!")w

Paul is also good.

[elf25s]

Paul is also good.

one word about poul

jenga!

[False Son]

Saw Earth to Echo last night.  What the heck is it with holly wood and all these 'shakey cam, follow you around with a camera films' these days??

Actually, as counterintuitive as it sounds, most films with shakeycam are actually shot on a stable platform and have the shake added in post production.  It gives the DP more freedom to shoot.  A shot intended to be shakey may not look good once in the can (or in the editing suite if shot digitally) because all the movement didn't work with the lighting, the background colors, etc.

If it wasn't for that and a few BIG spastyc moments imo, it would have been a much more decent film.  As is it was at least a 2 on the 5 star scale.

Unfortunately, it is really, really popular right now.  So are "Inception Booms" and Dutch Angles seem to be en vogue again.  There are movies like Children of Men that combine shakeycam with long shot format to really give credit to both techniques.  Then there are movies like the first Hunger Games that features nauseating levels of shakeycam in the beginning for no obvious reason, then drops it two minutes in. 

By far the most annoying shooting format, to me, is found footage.


I watched the remake of The Crazies last night.  For a disposable horror movie it was actually fairly well put together.

[Banzai]

I can appreciate the Found Footage as a narrative form from the stand point of small companies trying to make a film on a shoestring (The Blair Witch Project and 6-5=2, a pretty good Indian film made for less that $50,000 USD,) and I think it has been done well in a few instances, within a specific genre (Cloverfield, Troll Hunter as the only two I can think of,) but for the most part, yeah, I agree.  Found footage sucks.

[False Son]

I hate to say it, but the worst example i've encountered was the old master George Romaro's Diary of the Dead, which combines found footage sequences as part of the storytelling.  In addition to just being a bad movie, it kind of highlights the decline of the horror genre at the hands of a former master and the needless exploration of filming formats for the sake of remaining hip.  Sad.  So sad.

Or, I could have missed the point entirely and it was a commentary of how low budget filmaking is still putting out junk movies despite better, cheaper tools being available.  Who better than Romaro to deliver that kind of message.  Even in a real zombie appocalypse there would be people trying to make a cheap movie that couldn't capture actual tension even when zombies are eating the cameraman.

[Banzai]

Yeah, that was my first thought as well.  Horrid movie, horrid idea, and done before.  And while I would prefer your second theory, I have fears is is far more the first.   :-[  Survival of the Dead argues that point.

[garhkal]

Chronicle and Cloverfield to me are the only 2 Decent 'found footage films' out there.  Though looking it up, the new one Into the Storm looks like it also is a found footage film.  Wonder if that will bias my mind since i actually LIKE the previews for it.

[MoneyLovinOgre4Hire]

I saw Cloverfield, and I really don't understand what was supposed to be so good about it.  The characters were idiots, the monster never got enough screen time, and the "interlude" scenes made no sense.

[elf25s]

I saw Cloverfield, and I really don't understand what was supposed to be so good about it.  The characters were idiots, the monster never got enough screen time, and the "interlude" scenes made no sense.

cloverfield....for some reason i wanted the idiots in that movie to go and try to hunt the monster and make bbq out of it while it killed them...it would had made the movie better

weird now i am in the mood to watch idiotcracy...go figure

[garhkal]

I saw Cloverfield, and I really don't understand what was supposed to be so good about it.  The characters were idiots, the monster never got enough screen time, and the "interlude" scenes made no sense.

Cloverfield was iirc supposed to be about a bunch of partiers in NY having to try and escape via tunnels and such, from a massive rampaging monster and those funky spider like little beasts that seemed to somehow transform people it bit into something else..

[MoneyLovinOgre4Hire]

The problem was that they kept turning around and heading back into the city every time they had a clear escape route (well, except at the bridge, since that was destroyed).  Also, the bite seemed to cause the victim to explode.

[False Son]

Chronicle and Cloverfield to me are the only 2 Decent 'found footage films' out there.  Though looking it up, the new one Into the Storm looks like it also is a found footage film.  Wonder if that will bias my mind since i actually LIKE the previews for it.

My wife rented it over the weekend.  Even for someone with decidedly low film expectations she said there was too much drama, not enough storm.

I saw Cloverfield, and I really don't understand what was supposed to be so good about it.  The characters were idiots, the monster never got enough screen time, and the "interlude" scenes made no sense.

Idiots, yes.  But, one of the points they make in the movie over and over is that they are conscious of the bad decisions they are making.  People when threatened don't always make great decisions.  They do make emotional decisions, like going back for loved ones because humans are emotional creatures with the occasional moment of rationale.  I actually liked that aspect of the movie.  Too many protagonists are making the right choices, ducking at the last second or heroicly making the dumb choice and succeeding. 

I also don't think the movie was really about the monster.  It was more like a metaphor for being powerless.

Cloverfield was iirc supposed to be about a bunch of partiers in NY having to try and escape via tunnels and such, from a massive rampaging monster and those funky spider like little beasts that seemed to somehow transform people it bit into something else..

J.J. Abrams said in an interview that he made the characters intentionally unlikeable from the start so that you would begin to sympathize with them as the movie went along.  They were all pretentious twerps, who ended up being exposed as vulnerable and scared thanks to the circumstances.  The one guy even endangered the whole group to go get to his girlfriend inside a toppled skyscraper.  Not a brilliant move, but one that people could understand.  When a disaster strikes we tend to think of our loved ones first.  The running joke that everyone hated the cameraman for having the camera out the whole time, only to use the camera in the tunnels and to record their last words.

Overall, good storytelling choices, but not the most memorable movie.

[MoneyLovinOgre4Hire]

For me, anyway, his attempt backfired.  Making the characters unlikable at the beginning just made me annoyed with the movie in general and the continually pushing of "we've got to go save my girlfriend who isn't really my girlfriend anymore" just made me wish that the other characters would wise up and leave him.

[garhkal]

For me, anyway, his attempt backfired.  Making the characters unlikable at the beginning just made me annoyed with the movie in general and the continually pushing of "we've got to go save my girlfriend who isn't really my girlfriend anymore" just made me wish that the other characters would wise up and leave him.

Look at how many zombie flicks have that sort of issue arise, where someone just "Has to go rescue this or that loved one, who has dumped them repeatedly" just cause they feel if they rescue them they may get another chance.  In many of them, i ALWAYS love it when that person is one of those who gets killed for said stupidity.  But too damn often they are the ones who survive.

[MoneyLovinOgre4Hire]

I'd like to see a zom-com where the female lead ends up pushing the male lead to the zombies at the end of the movie because of his stubborn refusal to accept that they're no longer together.

[Meow Liao]

Anne Francis stars in...Forbidden Planet.

It's classic sci fi time.  I've had this sitting on the dvr since 12/14.  Time to watch it again and clear the space.  I do like the opening narration where we finally reach the moon in the last decade of the 21st century.  Maybe we'll get back by then. And look...the landing party consists of the captain, XO, and ship's doctor.  How original.   ;)

Meow Liao

[bytor]

Anne Francis stars in...Forbidden Planet.

It's classic sci fi time.  I've had this sitting on the dvr since 12/14.  Time to watch it again and clear the space.  I do like the opening narration where we finally reach the moon in the last decade of the 21st century.  Maybe we'll get back by then. And look...the landing party consists of the captain, XO, and ship's doctor.  How original.   ;)

Meow Liao

One of my favorites!  I have the blue-ray release, lots of cool extras. 

Funny that this came up, I introduced my daughter to the hilarity of "Airplane!" this evening, another Leslie Nielsen movie.

[False Son]

I'd like to see a zom-com where the female lead ends up pushing the male lead to the zombies at the end of the movie because of his stubborn refusal to accept that they're no longer together.

That would require a zombie movie to abandon the long standing tradition of Useless Woman Syndrome.  It is a sad fact of the genre.  Shaun of the Dead is the only one I can think of where everyone is equally inept.

[Banzai]

I'd like to see a zom-com where the female lead ends up pushing the male lead to the zombies at the end of the movie because of his stubborn refusal to accept that they're no longer together.

Not exactly a Zom-Rom-Com, but there is this:   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U_3AoMf7SIo

 :)

[garhkal]

I'd like to see a zom-com where the female lead ends up pushing the male lead to the zombies at the end of the movie because of his stubborn refusal to accept that they're no longer together.

Or the guy does it to the gal cause she keeps spurning his advances!

[MoneyLovinOgre4Hire]

I'm not going to touch that.

[Mastergunz]

Watched 'CHEF' last night and really enjoyed it.  ;D Also watched 22 Jump street and not so much.....

-Gunz

[THUD]

Watched 'CHEF' last night and really enjoyed it.  ;D Also watched 22 Jump street and not so much.....

-Gunz

I can't be the only one who thought that Chef was nothing but a big screw you to all the Iron Man 2 haters, right?  Great movie.

[Aokarasu]

"Oceans Thirteen" - better than 12, but not as good as 11, in my book.

[bytor]

Where Eagles Dare

Also tried to watch 1941 last night on Netflix, they are going to pull it on Monday so I wanted to watch it again before it was gone.  But, only got halfway through and Netflix was having "problems" with it.  Going to try again tonight.

[Aokarasu]

"The Lego Movie." Wife and kids had seen it at one point, don't remember why I couldn't/didn't. When the DVD first became available, wife bought it; my daughter has a particularly bad habit of pressing down on the lid/cover of the portable DVD player we have while the movie is in it and playing, which inevitably leads to damaged/unplayable discs. She had done that with that movie, unbeknownst to me, so when I went to watch it, about 45 minutes in, it would no longer read the disc. Fast forward to today, when my wife had re-ordered it, courtesy of holiday sales, and I finally got to watch it all the way through.

Thoroughly enjoyed it.

[garhkal]

How old's your daughter?
Have you thought of moving the disk player to a higher spot so she can't do that?

[Aokarasu]

How old's your daughter?
Have you thought of moving the disk player to a higher spot so she can't do that?

She'll be 6 in a month, and it's a portable one we take with us in the car. She hasn't been allowed to use it much since that incident.