More of my summer at the movies
This so far mostly sucky year is half over. Woop.
The Spousal Unit and I saw Cowboys and Aliens this afternoon, and we liked it. It totally had a graphic novel feel to it, and the name was truth in advertising. Cowboys fighting aliens - exactly what we were expecting. I don't know what the hell the critics were expecting, but it was what it was and what it was supposed to be, plus a good solid cast FTW. We had fun. Did Olivia Wilde shoot a movie a week last year, and is there a movie out there she's not in? Ambitious girl.
The only real nit I had is that one of the scenes/lines they've been showing in the previews never ended up in the final cut. That always annoys me!
Last weekend we saw Captain America and that was generally good too. Dragged a bit in parts toward the end, and Evans' Captain America always had a bit of a CGI feel to him even when he wasn't technically CGI'd. Evans certainly has a baby-faced clean-cut look to him, which works for the role - but he was, maybe not so ironically, not exactly the most memorable part.
And I don't really know all about the comic series, so I assume there was a Hydra and Red Skull. But I thought CA's original foe was Hitler and the Nazis, that being the whole point of the comic series at the beginning. And frankly that would have been plenty. After all, Indiana Jones did just fine with Hitler and his search for mystical artifacts. I thought Red Skull was too much overkill.
Tommy Lee Jones was terrific and stole the movie, of course, as did Stanley Tucci for as long as his character lasted. Of course, I still would love to have seen what Jensen Ackles could have done with the role, how he may have fleshed it out better - though maybe now that he's in his early 30's, he would have been a bit too old for the part. Then again, Jensen manages to still look like he's in his 20's at times, so push come to shove I know he could have pulled it off.
I've definitely seen more movies this summer than I have in years. The only ones we missed that we kind of wanted to see was Bridesmaids and Green Lantern. I know the latter got really bad reviews, but we might have enjoyed it in the right frame of mind, just as we did Cowboys and Aliens. Bridesmaids is one I can wait to see on HBO, but I do want to see it eventually.
I've had some strange dreams lately that were a direct result of what I happened to watch that night on TV. Like last Sunday night I dreamed we were living in a cave with a small group of people after an armageddon-like event where we were having to scrounge for food, and the creature comforts like electricity was no more. And at some point I was roaming a neighborhood in Hollywood where stars once lived (no idea why!), and some of the houses were still running on generators, but most weren't. And there was a swimming pool in the front yard of one house. Of course, that night before I went to bed I had watched Falling Skies.
Then one day last week I was flipping channels and happened upon that HBO documentary called There's Something Wrong With Aunt Diane about Diane Schuler, the NY woman who had driven erratically for hours coming home from a camping trip with five kids in the car until she ended up crashing into another vehicle going the wrong way on the Taconic Highway, killing a total of eight people.
So that night I dreamed I was driving north on Hwy 75 and was pulling into the Ocala rest stop, and there was a heavy sense of foreboding in what I was doing. Of course, I've been driving back and forth between Orlando and Gainesville quite a bit lately, so I'm sure that factored into the dream too.
I also had a dream this week that The Maternal Unit was living with me, and that's at least the second dream I've had since she died where I thought was still alive. I guess I'll have those dreams for a while.
The Spousal Unit and I saw Cowboys and Aliens this afternoon, and we liked it. It totally had a graphic novel feel to it, and the name was truth in advertising. Cowboys fighting aliens - exactly what we were expecting. I don't know what the hell the critics were expecting, but it was what it was and what it was supposed to be, plus a good solid cast FTW. We had fun. Did Olivia Wilde shoot a movie a week last year, and is there a movie out there she's not in? Ambitious girl.
The only real nit I had is that one of the scenes/lines they've been showing in the previews never ended up in the final cut. That always annoys me!
Last weekend we saw Captain America and that was generally good too. Dragged a bit in parts toward the end, and Evans' Captain America always had a bit of a CGI feel to him even when he wasn't technically CGI'd. Evans certainly has a baby-faced clean-cut look to him, which works for the role - but he was, maybe not so ironically, not exactly the most memorable part.
And I don't really know all about the comic series, so I assume there was a Hydra and Red Skull. But I thought CA's original foe was Hitler and the Nazis, that being the whole point of the comic series at the beginning. And frankly that would have been plenty. After all, Indiana Jones did just fine with Hitler and his search for mystical artifacts. I thought Red Skull was too much overkill.
Tommy Lee Jones was terrific and stole the movie, of course, as did Stanley Tucci for as long as his character lasted. Of course, I still would love to have seen what Jensen Ackles could have done with the role, how he may have fleshed it out better - though maybe now that he's in his early 30's, he would have been a bit too old for the part. Then again, Jensen manages to still look like he's in his 20's at times, so push come to shove I know he could have pulled it off.
I've definitely seen more movies this summer than I have in years. The only ones we missed that we kind of wanted to see was Bridesmaids and Green Lantern. I know the latter got really bad reviews, but we might have enjoyed it in the right frame of mind, just as we did Cowboys and Aliens. Bridesmaids is one I can wait to see on HBO, but I do want to see it eventually.
I've had some strange dreams lately that were a direct result of what I happened to watch that night on TV. Like last Sunday night I dreamed we were living in a cave with a small group of people after an armageddon-like event where we were having to scrounge for food, and the creature comforts like electricity was no more. And at some point I was roaming a neighborhood in Hollywood where stars once lived (no idea why!), and some of the houses were still running on generators, but most weren't. And there was a swimming pool in the front yard of one house. Of course, that night before I went to bed I had watched Falling Skies.
Then one day last week I was flipping channels and happened upon that HBO documentary called There's Something Wrong With Aunt Diane about Diane Schuler, the NY woman who had driven erratically for hours coming home from a camping trip with five kids in the car until she ended up crashing into another vehicle going the wrong way on the Taconic Highway, killing a total of eight people.
So that night I dreamed I was driving north on Hwy 75 and was pulling into the Ocala rest stop, and there was a heavy sense of foreboding in what I was doing. Of course, I've been driving back and forth between Orlando and Gainesville quite a bit lately, so I'm sure that factored into the dream too.
I also had a dream this week that The Maternal Unit was living with me, and that's at least the second dream I've had since she died where I thought was still alive. I guess I'll have those dreams for a while.