Movies
I've caught a few movies on TV recently that make me ponder things about then I don't usually - or haven't in the past, at least.
Highlander
How can such horrible elements combine into something so great?
The special effects are cheesy (that's supposed to be blood?), the flow is disjointed, the acting is... well, I can't say that I think the acting is good and yet I'm fond of the performances. You even get a survivalist gun nut with an uzi thrown in for no apparent reason. And the swordplay. Oh my god that's terrible, and I've cringed ever since when I see someone block a straight-on swing with a katana.
And yet, it's great. The idea was so out there and didn't require an explanation (no one knows why there are immortals or why the game has "rules," it just is). The scene transitions are artistically done. The music is cohesive. Overall, the movie is inspiring and "cool." It may well be responsible for biasing an entire generation toward "Japanese swords are the best!"
Equilibrium
Overshadowed, perhaps, by the release of the Matrix, this movie is better in some ways. It doesn't do the fun action quite as well perhaps. Instead of a questioning of reality, there's a more classic distopian future used to show how humans could come to lose their humanity, and a fight to regain it. The movie feels just a touch "off" to me, though I'm not sure whether it's acting or pacing or what. It's still a good movie with no serious flaws.
And the whole Gun Kata thing is almost for handguns what Highlander was for swords. There's this "oh cool" feeling about it, and yet if you actually apply a little sense to it, the whole premise is preposterous. Just like swinging a sword to hit the other guy's sword out in front of you is pretty silly (as an actual attack anyway), the thought of standing in the middle of a room while people are shooting at you is utter foolishness.
Aliens
I love this movie. It's wonderfully quotable. The effects hold up surprisingly well. I'm not sure I'd give awards for acting, and yet it's good enough that I tend to find all the characters believable, which should be the point. I'm sure there are tactical errors beyond the most glaring (leaving the dropship open and vulnerable), but it feels convincing enough. I think I have at least two versions of this on tape and I feel I should pick up a DVD or Blue Ray version if available...
Mutant Chronicles
I only knew about this movie due to frequenting sites like io9.com. It was pretty low key and even rates "independent film" status. I didn't know much about the game it was based on, though I had heard of it.
Wow, just... wow. I have to call this the worst movie I've seen in a long time. And I'm going to give spoilers here because, frankly, I don't feel anyone should feel any sense of needing to watch it to judge for themselves.
The setting is offered in heavy-handed narration fashion. Even when the "team" is assembled, there's a going through the roster and describing each person (rather than making their personalities show through, y'know, acting). The acting was mostly cheesy. I don't know whether Ron Perlman just can't sense low-quality movies, or genuinely loves the sci-fi genre enough to do them anyway. I hope it's the latter.
The effects actually aren't bad, per se. The movie has the look of extensive green screen use, where very little background is actually real. The problem is it's over-stylized. I know the point is to make a dark, WWI/steampunk/sci-fi atmosphere, but the greys and browns (with bright red blood) are boring and dull.
Oof. And the plot/setting itself? It's almost interesting, but I don't recall any in-movie explanation of why people with interplanetary travel are fighting WWI-style trench wars. Tanks, artillery, guns - they're all high-tech, yet function in exactly the same role as of old (even the tanks are used more as armored transports than weapons).
Then an ancient mutant-machine machine is unearths and mutants swarm out, killing the normal soliders. Woo-hoo! In short order, the megacorp heads are talking about evacuating people to Mars, giving up on the Earth entirely. But wait, a religious order has foreseen this and knows about the machine, and their leader wants twenty soldiers to go on a mission and save the world, because they can go "where armies cannot." ... Seriously? They're giving up the planet and they haven't tried commando assaults?
He gets some evacuation tickets to bribe people with, so the volunteers for this suicide mission can save a couple people of their choosing. Yay them. He still doesn't get twenty people, but that's good because he gets exactly enough to pass out the relic swords he had to. Hmm. They go in. On the way, one guy distinguishes himself as being "good," setting him up as the main hero (as if you missed the fact that he was in the opening battle and survived).
Mutants are fought. Things explode. People die. The details really aren't important because the characters really aren't important. The last few make it to the heart of the machine with their "we think this is a bomb because it fits into the machine" (great logic on that one). It's finally plugged in and the machine doesn't explode but is launched into space. Everyone dies save the hero, who's been partially mutated. As if that weren't depressing enough, the last scene shows the launched machine seemingly going toward Mars - where all the "saved" people went. Uhh... great. So everyone they fought to get off the planet is probably going to die soon anyway. Lovely message there.
So... uhh... yeah, I don't even know what the overal point was. A visually drag display of how futile fighting for life is? ... Got me. I was doing other things while watching the movie, and I still kinda want my time back.
Highlander
How can such horrible elements combine into something so great?
The special effects are cheesy (that's supposed to be blood?), the flow is disjointed, the acting is... well, I can't say that I think the acting is good and yet I'm fond of the performances. You even get a survivalist gun nut with an uzi thrown in for no apparent reason. And the swordplay. Oh my god that's terrible, and I've cringed ever since when I see someone block a straight-on swing with a katana.
And yet, it's great. The idea was so out there and didn't require an explanation (no one knows why there are immortals or why the game has "rules," it just is). The scene transitions are artistically done. The music is cohesive. Overall, the movie is inspiring and "cool." It may well be responsible for biasing an entire generation toward "Japanese swords are the best!"
Equilibrium
Overshadowed, perhaps, by the release of the Matrix, this movie is better in some ways. It doesn't do the fun action quite as well perhaps. Instead of a questioning of reality, there's a more classic distopian future used to show how humans could come to lose their humanity, and a fight to regain it. The movie feels just a touch "off" to me, though I'm not sure whether it's acting or pacing or what. It's still a good movie with no serious flaws.
And the whole Gun Kata thing is almost for handguns what Highlander was for swords. There's this "oh cool" feeling about it, and yet if you actually apply a little sense to it, the whole premise is preposterous. Just like swinging a sword to hit the other guy's sword out in front of you is pretty silly (as an actual attack anyway), the thought of standing in the middle of a room while people are shooting at you is utter foolishness.
Aliens
I love this movie. It's wonderfully quotable. The effects hold up surprisingly well. I'm not sure I'd give awards for acting, and yet it's good enough that I tend to find all the characters believable, which should be the point. I'm sure there are tactical errors beyond the most glaring (leaving the dropship open and vulnerable), but it feels convincing enough. I think I have at least two versions of this on tape and I feel I should pick up a DVD or Blue Ray version if available...
Mutant Chronicles
I only knew about this movie due to frequenting sites like io9.com. It was pretty low key and even rates "independent film" status. I didn't know much about the game it was based on, though I had heard of it.
Wow, just... wow. I have to call this the worst movie I've seen in a long time. And I'm going to give spoilers here because, frankly, I don't feel anyone should feel any sense of needing to watch it to judge for themselves.
The setting is offered in heavy-handed narration fashion. Even when the "team" is assembled, there's a going through the roster and describing each person (rather than making their personalities show through, y'know, acting). The acting was mostly cheesy. I don't know whether Ron Perlman just can't sense low-quality movies, or genuinely loves the sci-fi genre enough to do them anyway. I hope it's the latter.
The effects actually aren't bad, per se. The movie has the look of extensive green screen use, where very little background is actually real. The problem is it's over-stylized. I know the point is to make a dark, WWI/steampunk/sci-fi atmosphere, but the greys and browns (with bright red blood) are boring and dull.
Oof. And the plot/setting itself? It's almost interesting, but I don't recall any in-movie explanation of why people with interplanetary travel are fighting WWI-style trench wars. Tanks, artillery, guns - they're all high-tech, yet function in exactly the same role as of old (even the tanks are used more as armored transports than weapons).
Then an ancient mutant-machine machine is unearths and mutants swarm out, killing the normal soliders. Woo-hoo! In short order, the megacorp heads are talking about evacuating people to Mars, giving up on the Earth entirely. But wait, a religious order has foreseen this and knows about the machine, and their leader wants twenty soldiers to go on a mission and save the world, because they can go "where armies cannot." ... Seriously? They're giving up the planet and they haven't tried commando assaults?
He gets some evacuation tickets to bribe people with, so the volunteers for this suicide mission can save a couple people of their choosing. Yay them. He still doesn't get twenty people, but that's good because he gets exactly enough to pass out the relic swords he had to. Hmm. They go in. On the way, one guy distinguishes himself as being "good," setting him up as the main hero (as if you missed the fact that he was in the opening battle and survived).
Mutants are fought. Things explode. People die. The details really aren't important because the characters really aren't important. The last few make it to the heart of the machine with their "we think this is a bomb because it fits into the machine" (great logic on that one). It's finally plugged in and the machine doesn't explode but is launched into space. Everyone dies save the hero, who's been partially mutated. As if that weren't depressing enough, the last scene shows the launched machine seemingly going toward Mars - where all the "saved" people went. Uhh... great. So everyone they fought to get off the planet is probably going to die soon anyway. Lovely message there.
So... uhh... yeah, I don't even know what the overal point was. A visually drag display of how futile fighting for life is? ... Got me. I was doing other things while watching the movie, and I still kinda want my time back.
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