Movies n Photos
Here we go with Movie Log 2013! The goal = 50 new-to-me movies in 365 days.
01. Daybreakers (2009) - starring Ethan Hawke, Willem Dafoe, Sam Neill
In the year 2019, vampires have taken over 95% of the Earth's population. They are so prevalent, in fact, that they are running out of blood. Ethan Hawke plays a vampire hematologist sympathetic to the humans who is trying to develop a synthetic blood source, while the awesome Willem Dafoe plays a human who has discovered a very painful cure for vampirism. I really enjoyed the premise of the movie, but the execution was lacking. This was actually the kind of thing that I could see working as an awesome TV show, following the few surviving humans in their quest to avoid the vampire bureaucracy while trying to figure out how to get their cure to the masses. The movies ended with a literal ride into the sunset for our heroes, yet their cure was actually un-distributable. Would be interesting to see that expanded on, I think.
02. Easy A (2010) - starring Emma Stone, Penn Badgley, Amanda Bynes
I thought the trailer looked funny. I wanted to like this. I kind of hated it.
Some of that, I think, is my fault. I'm just at the point where I think 98% of high-schoolers and their problems are nothing but annoying. Part of it, I think, is the fault of the script: I have big issues when characters spew off intelligent, rapid-fire dialogue without even a pause to think. It is a skill to pull that off and not come across like a "character", and unfortunately the cast of Easy A fails at it. (See: the cast of Frasier on how to do it right.) Mostly, though, I disliked this because I was just bored. Bored. Superbored. Bored out of my pants bored.
03. Warm Bodies (2013) - starring Nicholas Hoult, John Malkovich
Look at me, actually going to the theatre. Well of course you know I had to - it's ZOMBIES! Zombie parodies/comedies have to walk a very fine line. The best ones, IMO, work because the actors play their parts seriously even if the premise and what's happening around them isn't serious at all. (Actually, I think this kind of applies to all of my favourite comedies, as well as zombie films in general - you have to be "real" even if the situation isn't very real.) Shawn of the Dead and Fido succeed wonderfully at this; Zombieland does not.
Anyhoo. Put Warm Bodies into the win category. It's basically Romeo and Juliet, except in this case Romeo is R, a zombie who, yes, eats people, but at least he's conflicted about it. And Juliet is Julia, who falls for him anyway, despite her father's objection. It's a bit overlong, but it's a world that makes sense and nobody really goes super over-the-top. It's also a much more clever movie than the trailers make it out to be, actually having something to say about our reliance on technology and loss of human interaction. I liked it a lot.
04. A Good Day to Die Hard (2013) - starring Bruce Willis, Jai Courtney
I went to the latest Die Hard movie expecting it to be "not awful".
It is awful. Horrendously awful. A world of awful.
The plot is contrived, the dialogue is stilted and clunky, the 'comedy' is painfully unfunny, the action sequences are awkwardly staged and run on for far too long. You know how there were people who criticized Live Free or Die Hard because they felt that John surfing on the fighter jet put him into superhuman mode and he lost his everyman status? Well, IMO, after the first action sequence (a car chase) in this movie… John McClane should be DEAD. Yeah. But the worst sin in my book: John McClane is NOT John McClane. I don't know what prompted this characterization, but this is not a McClane that I recognize (except in occasional fleeting glimpses) at ALL - not in his cadence, not in the sentiments he expresses, not in his way of looking at things. This is just a generic action movie of the worst kind. *sigh*
It did have two good things going for it: a. Jai actually looks quite a bit like Bruce, in that I could see where Jack would be John's son. And b. there was a bald joke.
That's all I got, folks.
Photo-a-Day for the last two days:
February 14, 2013 - Prompt: Love is...
... the fantabulous Amy, who spent her Valentine's Day with ME instead of her hubby. Yup, now that's love. Amy was my dinner and a movie date. Our threesome with Bruce wasn't as fab as we hoped it would be -- to give you a further idea of just how awful DH5 is, Amy fell asleep. During an action movie. Yes. -- but we still had a lovely time together.
February 15, 2013 - Prompt: inside your fridge
I wish I could say this is because I haven't gone grocery shopping yet (which is true) but this is pretty much what the inside of my fridge always looks like.
My apartment is chilly. My apartment is NEVER chilly. I think it might be just me. Ever since I had the damn tooth pulled, I seem to be feeling the cold more than usual. Like I stand outside for my smoke breaks at night, and I have done that in -25 degree weather and been FINE, and last night it was like -8 and I was SHIVERING. Just weird.
Nowwwww... writing or nap, writing or nap?
.
01. Daybreakers (2009) - starring Ethan Hawke, Willem Dafoe, Sam Neill
In the year 2019, vampires have taken over 95% of the Earth's population. They are so prevalent, in fact, that they are running out of blood. Ethan Hawke plays a vampire hematologist sympathetic to the humans who is trying to develop a synthetic blood source, while the awesome Willem Dafoe plays a human who has discovered a very painful cure for vampirism. I really enjoyed the premise of the movie, but the execution was lacking. This was actually the kind of thing that I could see working as an awesome TV show, following the few surviving humans in their quest to avoid the vampire bureaucracy while trying to figure out how to get their cure to the masses. The movies ended with a literal ride into the sunset for our heroes, yet their cure was actually un-distributable. Would be interesting to see that expanded on, I think.
02. Easy A (2010) - starring Emma Stone, Penn Badgley, Amanda Bynes
I thought the trailer looked funny. I wanted to like this. I kind of hated it.
Some of that, I think, is my fault. I'm just at the point where I think 98% of high-schoolers and their problems are nothing but annoying. Part of it, I think, is the fault of the script: I have big issues when characters spew off intelligent, rapid-fire dialogue without even a pause to think. It is a skill to pull that off and not come across like a "character", and unfortunately the cast of Easy A fails at it. (See: the cast of Frasier on how to do it right.) Mostly, though, I disliked this because I was just bored. Bored. Superbored. Bored out of my pants bored.
03. Warm Bodies (2013) - starring Nicholas Hoult, John Malkovich
Look at me, actually going to the theatre. Well of course you know I had to - it's ZOMBIES! Zombie parodies/comedies have to walk a very fine line. The best ones, IMO, work because the actors play their parts seriously even if the premise and what's happening around them isn't serious at all. (Actually, I think this kind of applies to all of my favourite comedies, as well as zombie films in general - you have to be "real" even if the situation isn't very real.) Shawn of the Dead and Fido succeed wonderfully at this; Zombieland does not.
Anyhoo. Put Warm Bodies into the win category. It's basically Romeo and Juliet, except in this case Romeo is R, a zombie who, yes, eats people, but at least he's conflicted about it. And Juliet is Julia, who falls for him anyway, despite her father's objection. It's a bit overlong, but it's a world that makes sense and nobody really goes super over-the-top. It's also a much more clever movie than the trailers make it out to be, actually having something to say about our reliance on technology and loss of human interaction. I liked it a lot.
04. A Good Day to Die Hard (2013) - starring Bruce Willis, Jai Courtney
I went to the latest Die Hard movie expecting it to be "not awful".
It is awful. Horrendously awful. A world of awful.
The plot is contrived, the dialogue is stilted and clunky, the 'comedy' is painfully unfunny, the action sequences are awkwardly staged and run on for far too long. You know how there were people who criticized Live Free or Die Hard because they felt that John surfing on the fighter jet put him into superhuman mode and he lost his everyman status? Well, IMO, after the first action sequence (a car chase) in this movie… John McClane should be DEAD. Yeah. But the worst sin in my book: John McClane is NOT John McClane. I don't know what prompted this characterization, but this is not a McClane that I recognize (except in occasional fleeting glimpses) at ALL - not in his cadence, not in the sentiments he expresses, not in his way of looking at things. This is just a generic action movie of the worst kind. *sigh*
It did have two good things going for it: a. Jai actually looks quite a bit like Bruce, in that I could see where Jack would be John's son. And b. there was a bald joke.
That's all I got, folks.
Photo-a-Day for the last two days:
February 14, 2013 - Prompt: Love is...
... the fantabulous Amy, who spent her Valentine's Day with ME instead of her hubby. Yup, now that's love. Amy was my dinner and a movie date. Our threesome with Bruce wasn't as fab as we hoped it would be -- to give you a further idea of just how awful DH5 is, Amy fell asleep. During an action movie. Yes. -- but we still had a lovely time together.
February 15, 2013 - Prompt: inside your fridge
I wish I could say this is because I haven't gone grocery shopping yet (which is true) but this is pretty much what the inside of my fridge always looks like.
My apartment is chilly. My apartment is NEVER chilly. I think it might be just me. Ever since I had the damn tooth pulled, I seem to be feeling the cold more than usual. Like I stand outside for my smoke breaks at night, and I have done that in -25 degree weather and been FINE, and last night it was like -8 and I was SHIVERING. Just weird.
Nowwwww... writing or nap, writing or nap?
.