Da Vinci
Ok, so despite my best efforts not to, I went to see the Da Vinci Code last night. It's not that I'm opposed to its "revolutionary ideas" or anything-- I just thought the book was poorly written, I don't particularly like Ron Howard, and I really don't like Tom Hanks. So I was prepared for a general suckfest.
Meuy, Kristin and I went with this guy, Eric, who's a regular customer at Kristin's coffee shop. The whole story is long and complicated, but to sum up: Eric is 26, he's a financial consultant, he's non-creepy, his looks are best described as scruffy, glasses, jewish, skinny. I don't really know how we let him pay for all of us, but there it is.
As far as the actual movie, it certainly wasn't good. It wasn't gigli bad, but it wasn't good. Tom Hanks was awfully wooden, and sporting his worst haircut to date. Amelie girl was okay, but she had a hard time connecting with Hanks. Gandalf gave a pretty quality preformance, though. I really hated the technique of massively brightening the letters or symbols that our attention was supposed to be focused on, it slaughtered any chance at suspension of disbelief and reminded me too much of professors using laser pointers to indicate things in lecture. {{cuts massive rant about acting/shooting/directing/writing}} Overall, the movie felt really really rushed; there was pretty much nothing in the way of dramatic pauses, because any time that wasn't filled with dialogue or action was special effects-ed up beyond belief. apparently you can't just look at Newton's tomb, you have to add glowing parts and imaginary moving doohickeys and stuff that makes you think you're watching one of those educational videos on "bringing math/science to life!! In Cartoon!! OMG can we condescend to you a little more?!?!" The movie treats symbology as shorthand for english, like the symbols themselves are only as good as their prose interpretations.
All right, all, right, so you get that I think it's a dumbed-down, fx-ed up, badly acted, poorly directed, boring movie. I'll stop with the flogging now. On to the redeeming qualities!!!
The part of Da Vinci I enjoyed the most was (predictably, because I can't shut up about it) understanding the Latin phone conversations!! That was actually really exciting for me, more than any plot twist or camera shot. They even used fairly good pronunciation, considering it was church-latin.
But the best part by far was provided by my roomie, Meuy, who has not read the book. So in a certain scene where the entire rest of the audience knew that albino guy was about to jump out and attack, Meuy was so startled by the jumping out and the dramatic music of the ambush that she actually screamed. Not just a little, "eeep!" either; this was a full blown, horror movie actress, hands in the air, half falling out of her seat, protracted screech of terror. It was the most hilarious thing ever. Completely made my day.
Overall, I guess I'm not allowed to complain too much, since it was free, but I think we all know it's too late for that. So on to other matters.
I'm getting pushed pretty hard by my parents to drop summer session and "do something worthwhile" with my time. By which they apparently mean I should work on one of the gubernatorial campaigns this fall, since I'm so lovely and close to sacramento. I'd honestly rather pound my head into a wall. Let's see: #1 I don't like any of the candidates/parties. #2, I don't know what sort of valuable experience I'm expected to have, it'll all be stuffing envelopes and the like. #3 nobody is going to pay me for this. #4 I'd rather, um, NOT be here when it's 103 degrees in the shade and it's 100 miles to the ocean.
Memorial Day weekend was okay, I went home but didn't see anyone, being typically lazy. The family and I had lunch in North Beach on sunday-- it was really good and made me even more impatient for italy, when I'll eat that stuff all the time. Meantime, my days really aren't that bad, objectively speaking. I only went to 1 hour of class today, followed by a cheap latte and the crossword in Common grounds, and the rest of my day is allocated for making some photocopies, burning a CD, reading my dad's copy of "Harrius Potter et Philosophi Lapis", {{snip, snip, there goes a treatise on the quirks of the translation}}, watching a little baseball, and then North and South, here I come! Or possibly Lord of the Rings, which I just picked up at Target for $9. Probably should have gotten some exercise or eaten somewhere in there, but it's all good. Vale.
Meuy, Kristin and I went with this guy, Eric, who's a regular customer at Kristin's coffee shop. The whole story is long and complicated, but to sum up: Eric is 26, he's a financial consultant, he's non-creepy, his looks are best described as scruffy, glasses, jewish, skinny. I don't really know how we let him pay for all of us, but there it is.
As far as the actual movie, it certainly wasn't good. It wasn't gigli bad, but it wasn't good. Tom Hanks was awfully wooden, and sporting his worst haircut to date. Amelie girl was okay, but she had a hard time connecting with Hanks. Gandalf gave a pretty quality preformance, though. I really hated the technique of massively brightening the letters or symbols that our attention was supposed to be focused on, it slaughtered any chance at suspension of disbelief and reminded me too much of professors using laser pointers to indicate things in lecture. {{cuts massive rant about acting/shooting/directing/writing}} Overall, the movie felt really really rushed; there was pretty much nothing in the way of dramatic pauses, because any time that wasn't filled with dialogue or action was special effects-ed up beyond belief. apparently you can't just look at Newton's tomb, you have to add glowing parts and imaginary moving doohickeys and stuff that makes you think you're watching one of those educational videos on "bringing math/science to life!! In Cartoon!! OMG can we condescend to you a little more?!?!" The movie treats symbology as shorthand for english, like the symbols themselves are only as good as their prose interpretations.
All right, all, right, so you get that I think it's a dumbed-down, fx-ed up, badly acted, poorly directed, boring movie. I'll stop with the flogging now. On to the redeeming qualities!!!
The part of Da Vinci I enjoyed the most was (predictably, because I can't shut up about it) understanding the Latin phone conversations!! That was actually really exciting for me, more than any plot twist or camera shot. They even used fairly good pronunciation, considering it was church-latin.
But the best part by far was provided by my roomie, Meuy, who has not read the book. So in a certain scene where the entire rest of the audience knew that albino guy was about to jump out and attack, Meuy was so startled by the jumping out and the dramatic music of the ambush that she actually screamed. Not just a little, "eeep!" either; this was a full blown, horror movie actress, hands in the air, half falling out of her seat, protracted screech of terror. It was the most hilarious thing ever. Completely made my day.
Overall, I guess I'm not allowed to complain too much, since it was free, but I think we all know it's too late for that. So on to other matters.
I'm getting pushed pretty hard by my parents to drop summer session and "do something worthwhile" with my time. By which they apparently mean I should work on one of the gubernatorial campaigns this fall, since I'm so lovely and close to sacramento. I'd honestly rather pound my head into a wall. Let's see: #1 I don't like any of the candidates/parties. #2, I don't know what sort of valuable experience I'm expected to have, it'll all be stuffing envelopes and the like. #3 nobody is going to pay me for this. #4 I'd rather, um, NOT be here when it's 103 degrees in the shade and it's 100 miles to the ocean.
Memorial Day weekend was okay, I went home but didn't see anyone, being typically lazy. The family and I had lunch in North Beach on sunday-- it was really good and made me even more impatient for italy, when I'll eat that stuff all the time. Meantime, my days really aren't that bad, objectively speaking. I only went to 1 hour of class today, followed by a cheap latte and the crossword in Common grounds, and the rest of my day is allocated for making some photocopies, burning a CD, reading my dad's copy of "Harrius Potter et Philosophi Lapis", {{snip, snip, there goes a treatise on the quirks of the translation}}, watching a little baseball, and then North and South, here I come! Or possibly Lord of the Rings, which I just picked up at Target for $9. Probably should have gotten some exercise or eaten somewhere in there, but it's all good. Vale.