#26511  
Old 12-05-2008, 02:08 PM
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Geddy Geddy is offline
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Went and saw A Clockwork Orange in theaters last night. Such a great film and it was even better on the big screen.
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  #26512  
Old 12-05-2008, 02:45 PM
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ChronoGrl ChronoGrl is offline
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Ooook... Here we go.

Watch it, Old Man...

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Originally Posted by urgeok2 View Post
you so claaaazy !!!


ok .. the glove has been dropped.


here's why i personally think monsters inc is the best kids movie ever made.

(and let me first say that i am NOT a fan of Billy Crystal or John Goodman - to me - neither of them transitioned well to film .. i still see them as second rate TV actors - so by all rights i shouldn't like this film as much as i do)


1) the animation is gorgeous and imaginative. the monster characters are really well done. the 'doors' sequence was incredible
Agreed. I'm a sucker for good animation and this movie was quite impressive and gorgeous.

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2) a lot of fun animation in jokes to keep the adults amused
Agreed. It was playful and clever. I would say that its parts were greater than the movie as a whole, though.

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Originally Posted by urgeok2 View Post
3) the disney formula of killing a parent/sibling for easy emotional buy-in was abandoned. (see lion king/nemo/every other fucking Disney film) NOBODY HAD TO DIE !
Good GOD I agree with you - That's such a relief to me. As someone who's actually lost a parent, I've actually started getting offended by this new archetype in children's movies. Hits a little too close to home.



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4) the story was BRILLIANT ... wow Chrono - here we disagree the most. Maybe its because i have a kid but to me this film is the smartest, most effective, and most entertaining way of showing kids there is nothing to be afraid of in the dark i've ever seen in my lifetime. The monsters are more afraid of you than you are of them ?? brilliant !! Add some adventure thanks to a bad apple ... and i think you have a flawless story - and the resolution was fantastic as well ... both the fate of the bad guy and the new form of power. (laughter is more powerful that fear .... )
And it did it without being sucky.
Maybe I misspoke.

See, I really liked the concept of the parallel Monster World and the BIZARRO (if you will) reversal of the Monsters being afraid of children.

The plotline of the return journey, however, I found disappointing and a waste of interesting characters and settings. Though, this might speak more to me personally; I find that I get easily annoyed when children are created in animated films just simply to be cutsie. I realize that the point is so that the children watching the film can connect, but, well, obviously it's not for me. I found her more annoying than anything else.

So maybe it more more the vehicle (lost child) than anything else that I found insipid... Though I totally understand your reasoning - She is obviously the character that children should be relating to - I just didn't (that's not to say that adults can't; I just didn't.

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5) I'm a sucker for a bittersweet ending and i hate cheesy manipulative tear jerking disney bullshit - but the way this film ends - gets me in the heart every time ... subtle and touching as hell.
I think that because I found the Human Child to be annoying that the emotional ending just didn't connect to me.

Or maybe you're just a big softie. ;)


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Originally Posted by urgeok2 View Post
honestly - its one of the few movies i feel so strong about that i cant get my head around anyone not liking that. i'm usually far more impartial than that.


but if you consider this film overrated - then you're only talking about me - because the general public really paid no mind to this film ... proving again that the lowest common denominator is always satisfied with the same hamfisted bullshit formula over and over again.

kill kids parent ... kid grows through adversity and becomes a strong man/woman. yahoo ....
Weird... I actually thought that people went crazy over it; I didn't see that it was bypassed by people.

But back to the topic - Sorry if my "overrated" assessment offended you. SO not my intention. And, quite frankly, I didn't think that it was a horrible film at all. I think that part of my HUGE problem with the movie is incredibly personal; I'm actually pretty sure that I went into the movie with MASSIVE expectations which, too tell you the truth, would have been difficult to satisfy. That coupled with the fact that I found the film much, much more cutsie than I had anticipated really disappointed me.

Maybe THAT'S the better assessment. I was disappointed. But I probably just built it up too much in my mind.
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  #26513  
Old 12-05-2008, 06:38 PM
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ChronoGrl ChronoGrl is offline
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Been doing nothing much outside of watching free movies On Demand lately...

...


The Gravedancers





I came into this movie with VERY low expectations. I'm generally not a fan of supernatural films (unless their done really well; it's just a genre of horror that I find difficult to suspend my disbelief in), but I was pleasantly surprised with the beginning of this movie. Though obviously low budget with some struggling actors, I thought that it created suspense nicely in the first two thirds of the film. However, toward the end the super natural beings began to grow into a more corporeal state to the point of being just... silly.

Not a bad movie, but not amazing.

2.5/5

...

Wicked Little Things





Again, I went into this film with exceedingly low expectations, but would up actually fairly impressed. There's definitely suspenseful moments with a decent story and some pretty creepy-looking big bads. Also some really impressing performances overall (the main characters are a mother and two daughters; the relationship on screen was believable and touching).

Decent little horror flick. Perfect to sport in a Horrorfest and, I have to say, overall After Dark Horrorfest 2006 was, as a whole, better than Horrorfest 2007.

3/5

...

The People Under The Stairs





Wow.

Spider Baby meets Do the Right Thing. Two years after Spike Lee's indie masterpiece chronicling racial tensions in Brooklyn, Wes Craven decides to take his hand at portraying racial and socioeconomic tensions - in a horror movie.

Ok. I get it. I think that, at the time (1991) the allegory for class divides between the "ghettos" and the suburbs was probably a bit more poignant.

However, taken out of context, I found the metaphor played up racial stereotypes that I found unintentionally offensive and obtuse.

That and I HATED the fact that our Victim-turned-Hero (I GET it - boy's coming-of-age blah blah blah) was a 13-year-old was silly, unnecessary, unbelievable, and ultimately annoying.

That being said, the pulp elements of this film were absolutely incredible; what it did right, it did AMAZINGLY right, from a gimp-suit-clad Big Bad with a shotgun to the actual people under the stairs. Call me a cheap thrill seeker - FINE. I don't need Wes Craven to preach social hierarchies to me. He's preaching to the choir. Just give me my damn horror (oh, wait, I get it now - WE'RE THE HORROR............ sigh). Rob Zombie did it better in House of a Thousand Corpses.

3/5
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Last edited by ChronoGrl; 12-05-2008 at 06:40 PM.
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  #26514  
Old 12-05-2008, 06:43 PM
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neverending neverending is offline
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I like People Under the Stairs. It's just so over the top and crazy. Not perfect, but fun.
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  #26515  
Old 12-05-2008, 07:18 PM
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I like People Under the Stairs. It's just so over the top and crazy. Not perfect, but fun.
Yeah, that's my major takeaway too. It's definitely something that I'd own and watch again.
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  #26516  
Old 12-05-2008, 07:22 PM
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Yeah, that's my major takeaway too. It's definitely something that I'd own and watch again.
The crazy brother & sister were also in Twin Peaks- I always liked that.
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  #26517  
Old 12-05-2008, 07:34 PM
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urgeok2 urgeok2 is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ChronoGrl View Post

Watch it, Old Man...


The plotline of the return journey, however, I found disappointing and a waste of interesting characters and settings. Though, this might speak more to me personally; I find that I get easily annoyed when children are created in animated films just simply to be cutsie. I realize that the point is so that the children watching the film can connect, but, well, obviously it's not for me. I found her more annoying than anything else.

.

well the deal is - she had to be cutsie - it served the story .. had she been anything else it would have ended right there - unless you wanted a 3 hour drama... - if she wasnt cutsie she wouldnt have won over the monsters.

normally i dont like cute for the sake of cute - but in this case i really thought it was a good fit.



as far as it being an overlooked movie - oh yeah - hardly anyone ever mentions it.... even at disney world itself there's barely a presence (and this was before Pixar parted ways) there was a half hidden garage in an alley where you could pose with mike and Sully - that was it.... i couldnt believe it.



anyway.... to each his/her own ... all i can say is i am brutally tough on kids movie - because i have to see so damn many of them ...and so many of them are cheap ass garbage .. but this one really won me over.
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  #26518  
Old 12-05-2008, 07:44 PM
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ChronoGrl ChronoGrl is offline
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Quote:
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The crazy brother & sister were also in Twin Peaks- I always liked that.
OMG - You're RIGHT!! The whole time I was like, "They both look so damn familiar..."

Oh, wow. That makes me appreciate the movie even more. Awesome.
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  #26519  
Old 12-06-2008, 04:54 AM
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Despare Despare is offline
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Zombie Strippers
Fido
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Zombie Strippers was something else. An uninteresting political agenda mixed with bad dialogue and worse acting. There were a couple decent parts (the pool balls and the Mexican janitor come to mind) but when you can tell the cast is sporting airsoft guns things don't really draw you in.
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  #26520  
Old 12-06-2008, 08:37 AM
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The Fountain

Watched it again this morning...and for me, that really says something. No matter how much I enjoy a movie, it's usually months at the very least before I get around to revisiting it.

This movie completely and totally blew my mind. Everything about it is nigh on to perfect - the art direction (and the visuals in general), the score, the acting, the theme of life and death...the only thing that brings it down slightly is the script, which has some minor flaws (mostly in the dialogue), but otherwise - simply stunning.

Aronofsky has to be one of the most brilliant directors working today - you have no idea how excited I am to check out The Wrestler.
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