Movies out of boredom
I should have brought my book with me because I've been sitting here for the past half hour or so bored out of my mind. About the only exciting thing I learned that I didn't know (mostly because I must not have been paying any attention, or have been so preoccupied by other things) is that Guy Ritchie directed the new Sherlock Holmes movie. Combine that with Robert Downey Jr. and Jude Law and we have a movie I really want to see even though it seems to be a bit of a bastardization of the Sherlock mythos. It's kind of been a disappointing season for movies. Nothing really sticks out and asks to be a must see, just a "see if you feel like it". Avatar was described by one guy as a cross between Dances with Wolves and Fern Gully. I find it hard to argue with that sentiment. It's not like James Cameron is an amazing movie director. For all his accolades and the thankfulness we should have for him immortalizing the phrase "I'll be back" in typical Arnie fashion, what has he really ever done as a director? Well, he's spent huge budgets to make nice-looking movies that are, ultimately, a little lame. We looked past T2 and the whiny John Conner because Arnie was back and the special effects were awesome (and still look pretty good today). Titanic was lame. I know many people watched it five-billion times, but that doesn't make a movie good. There are millions of Cubs fans who prove that point: just because people like something, doesn't make it good. So if I tell you that I am not really looking forward to Avatar but may watch it due to the special effects, I hope you understand that I have very low expectations. He's better than Michael Bay... so at least he has that going for him. Michael Bay likes to destroy things and could care less about a story, even if it's a much-loved intellectual property that is ruined by the presence and dominance of the focus on Shia Lebouf, who has single-handedly ruined two franchises already for me: Transformers and Indiana Jones. Fuck, I just thought of the monkey swinging scene from Indy 4 and the anger welling up in me is pretty intense. That movie went totally downhill from about that point on... well, the killer ants were ridiculous as well... and fucking aliens... seriously? George Lucas should go directly to hell for the shit he has done to his top two franchises...