The Day the Earth Stood Still

broderic on December 29, 2008

All throughout The Day the Earth Stood Still you just know that Keanu Reeves is an emotionless alien and not just for the character he plays, but for his acting.

If there was one movie not worth remaking, it was the original, The Day the Earth Stood Still. It’s not that the original was a great movie not to be tinkered with, but that it’s message of peace, love and kindness among men can be told in hundreds of ways that something original can be created without rehashing the old. The original is a classic sci-fi film, and it has wonderful sci-fi elements. To update to now means to mash up sci-fi with the CG thriller action idioms that dominate Hollywood movies today. To update to now means to take those precious rhythms of the original story and flatten them to a monotone of contemporary dreariness. To update to now means to make a very forgettable film. The original was not.

In the original, the viewer was active in confronting the need for change. In the latest, the viewer is replaced by the plaintive wail of a character expressing that things can change. In the former, it is left to each one to devise whether change can happen. In the latter, the need for change is just another story moment. It is groveling which hurt the latest. That character seems to whine too much. In the original, we must change because we are confronted with the need to; we the viewer are asked to act. The latest makes us passive, and it makes us fools. No more whining about it.

2 of 5 stars.

Movie List 2008

broderic on December 28, 2008

I always compile this list before the end of the year. While looking over my posts of the movies I saw in the theatre, I was surprised that I had a lot of 2 stars even from the ones that were “good.” (I’m looking at you Dark Knight.) I’m also surprised that I saw very few movies. A rough estimate is about 60 this year whereas last year was probably around . I still a few reviews to post, but those films are just average or below. So here’s my list of 4+ star films.

Click the link to read my review. Post your own list.

I’ve also noticed that my list is getting shorter. Either I am becoming a better judge of movies or I am becoming more finicky.

Four Christmases

broderic on December 27, 2008

The poster for Four Christmases features the stars, Reese Witherspoon and Vince Vaughn, bound up in ribbon. You wish that you were bound up yourself to help avoid seeing this movie.

It’s about a couple, living in sin, not married, because they can do what Sally said, “Make love on the kitchen floor,” whenever they want. What they want is to avoid their relatives for Christmas by jetting out to Fiji. Unfortunately, not all goes according to plan. They end up having to go to all their parents’ house to visit for the day.

The parents are each divorced, which means that the couple doesn’t want to get married because they’ll just end up as their parents. Of course, with Christmas they get a warm welcome and realize perhaps being just a couple isn’t so worth it. The movie re-establishes traditional family values of marriage and kids as the end all be all of a loving relationship. Who cares? You knew that was coming. The stories were never funny enough. There was plenty of star power. In fact I was pleasantly surprised to see the boy named Sue show up as a reunion for the Swingers dudes.

Eh! I just didn’t find this funny or worth it at all.

2 of 5 stars.

Slumdog Millionaire

broderic on December 11, 2008

I am a Slumdog Millionaire only because I know the answers to the questions you ask. I don’t know everything. I know enough from my experiences, and not enough from my lack of experience. I am street smart if not book smart. I am lucky that things that happened to me are things that are easily to remember: the worst outhouse in Mumbai, the religious riots, Fagin, the three mouseketeers, etc., etc. I use this too my advantage. If there was a wall with pictures on it, I would’ve used that too. I am smart that way. I am a slumdog millionaire, and I know that my answers are correct because I am loved.

So it was written.

4 of 5 stars.

Australia

broderic on December 2, 2008

Australia is as big as the continent and takes as long to get to the end
as it does to get from Darwin to Sydney. Now I don't really know if
that's true, but it sounds like something you would say to make your
opening statement sound masterful. I don't know about the geographical
relationship between the two cities, and I don't know if it would take
just three hours to travel between them. Go google-map it and find out.
I just needed a hooky opening line for this review.Australia's hook is that Nicole Kidman, a bonafide aussie, plays an
English lady who arrives Down Under to pursue her dead husbands dream of
being a cattle baron. Just like other Westerns of the American Old
West. I can think that Kidman tries to tame the wild Outback, but it is
the Outback that she breaks her and she embraces it as she embraces the
young heart of the aborigine kid. Kidman starts as the classic duck out
of water. I think she would eventually become like Barbara Stanwyck in
Forty Guns, "a high riding woman with a whip," but only in my dreams.Then there is the sexiest man alive for 200x, Hugh Jackman. Water
caressing is sun baked body. Whew. Who wouldn't fall for that? He
should've been dumping the bucket of water on himself for the entire
movie. The girls would've loved that.The movie is long, but moves. The cattle drive does wonders to make it
work. Yet, the commercials and the trailer led me to believe that this
was Pearl Harbor all over again. The attack on Darwin were pretty much
over in minutes and appeared in the finale. I expected more.Overall, it is a much better movie than I anticipated it to be. I don't
think it would go on to be an Oscar contender, because it felt too much
like a Lonesome Dove or other CBS sweeps week western. 3 of 5 stars.

Twilight

broderic on December 1, 2008

Twilight is the movie version for the first book by Stephanie Myers in
her teen-angst vampire series. It already has an intended audience
built into it, one which I am not part of. I've seen most of the
adaptations of book series: The Lord of the Rings (the gold standard),
The Chronicles of Narnia (boring), Harry Potter (exciting). This is the
first that I have not read any of the books upon which the series will
be based. I am an outsider which colors my reaction to the movie.I don't really care for vampire stories. They are not my usually
scare-fest fare. I prefer haunted houses and ghosts stories to creep me
out. The only vampire story I like is Stephen King's Salems Lot,
because it had a haunted house, the old Marsden place, in it, and it was
sufficiently creepy enough to keep me up till the break of dawn like
many of the ghost stories I read at the time.So vampires kind of bore me. They are too emo for my taste. The lead
vampire in the film is too broody and conveys his angst with furrowed
eyebrows. He reminded me of Brenden Fraser. Then there is the head
vampire who reminded me of Tom Cruise's vampire Lestat. This was a
brilliant casting decision. Although, less broody than the lead
vampire, his angst was summed up in his choice of becoming "vegetarian."
Why must I want human blood?The movie probably satisfies the fans of the book. They get to see the
characters in the flesh which they could only do in their imagination
until now. I now understand how it is to be an outsider to these fan
movies. I can't fathom what emotions the readers of the book are
investing in the characters and story of this film, but I know that
theirs are assigned with great heart. I can't really give a good
review, because I don't really care about the story. As a movie though,
it seems to be an opening chapter: incomplete and waiting for the next
to arrive. I don't think I want to see the next one.2 of 5 stars.

Quote of the Day [12.01.08]

broderic on December 1, 2008

“Imagine me needing someone. Back on Earth I never did. Oh, there were women. Lots of women. Lots of love-making but no love. You see, that was the kind of world we’d made. So I left, because there was no one to hold me there.”

George Taylor (Charlton Heston), The Planet of the Apes