(no subject)
When I first heard about the John Carter movie, I was torn. On the one hand, it made me feel welcome, as it was clearly made for those in-the-know as they didn't bother to put "of Mars" or "of Barsoom" or any of that in the title. On the other hand, that certainly was a foolish way to market a movie.
And, as you may have heard, John Carter did not do very well at the box office. "Biggest bomb EVER" has been tossed around.
Don't believe the hype. It really is a very fun movie. I was finally getting to see Tharks up on the screen, and they weren't claymation, so that was very cool. There was also a lot of good humor in it, which was unexpected, although a nice surprise. Also, given what I remember about the first three books, the way they were presenting the story with the Therns was interesting, and I wanted to see where it was all going.
Plus, well, we are drowning a world of great British fantasy movies, and by the gods I wanted to see something that was
unequivocally, uniquely, true-blue American, dammit!
As a JCoM fan from way back, I'll admit that it isn't quite what I hoped it would be (the Tarkas/Sola relationship should have had more punch ((and, although I can't prove it, I suspect that ERB drew from Don Quixote for some of that)), but it had the look right, and the pacing was good, and the action was keen.
Which, of course, may not happen due to the biggest-bomb-EVER thing.
Now, I can understand your more standard garden variety movie critic not being enthused about this; they are not truly of the heroic fantasy body, after all, much less the rarified "Sword and Planet" body. Thing is, one of the loudest braying critics of this movie seems to be, well, Disney itself. As discussed here, that don't make no damn sense. Why shoot your foriegn markets and DVD sales in the foot?
I don't know if JC will pull out of its bad press quagmire, and that's a pity because I really wanted to see how they were going to make the next two movies. Maybe it will be a straight-to-DVD kind of thing. Worked for Starship Troopers. I do think that, like Blade Runner, it will be recognized as a better movie than we've been led to believe.
Chances are that if you're reading the HFQ blog, you have already seen this movie and know the truth of my words, but if you haven't-- get out and see this on the big screen if you can!
-Adrian Simmons
And, as you may have heard, John Carter did not do very well at the box office. "Biggest bomb EVER" has been tossed around.
Don't believe the hype. It really is a very fun movie. I was finally getting to see Tharks up on the screen, and they weren't claymation, so that was very cool. There was also a lot of good humor in it, which was unexpected, although a nice surprise. Also, given what I remember about the first three books, the way they were presenting the story with the Therns was interesting, and I wanted to see where it was all going.
Plus, well, we are drowning a world of great British fantasy movies, and by the gods I wanted to see something that was
unequivocally, uniquely, true-blue American, dammit!
As a JCoM fan from way back, I'll admit that it isn't quite what I hoped it would be (the Tarkas/Sola relationship should have had more punch ((and, although I can't prove it, I suspect that ERB drew from Don Quixote for some of that)), but it had the look right, and the pacing was good, and the action was keen.
Which, of course, may not happen due to the biggest-bomb-EVER thing.
Now, I can understand your more standard garden variety movie critic not being enthused about this; they are not truly of the heroic fantasy body, after all, much less the rarified "Sword and Planet" body. Thing is, one of the loudest braying critics of this movie seems to be, well, Disney itself. As discussed here, that don't make no damn sense. Why shoot your foriegn markets and DVD sales in the foot?
I don't know if JC will pull out of its bad press quagmire, and that's a pity because I really wanted to see how they were going to make the next two movies. Maybe it will be a straight-to-DVD kind of thing. Worked for Starship Troopers. I do think that, like Blade Runner, it will be recognized as a better movie than we've been led to believe.
Chances are that if you're reading the HFQ blog, you have already seen this movie and know the truth of my words, but if you haven't-- get out and see this on the big screen if you can!
-Adrian Simmons