6 posts tagged “seven thumbs”
Superbad is quite simply super awesome. The story is basically like any of a million other films in which a group of guys try to get the lady they want before the school year ends. From Fast Times at Ridgemont High to Porky's and any of a million other movies, the setup of the losers trying to be cool has been done lots and lots but this movie makes it work because the characters a) aren't 20-30 year olds and b) the jokes are actually funny.
I think that most guys can see themselves in the characters -- perhaps arguing over which one they are more like. The kid from Arrested Development is the most likable with the McLovin playing the typical nerd and the other kid doing his best Belushi/Farley impression. It is the final days of high school and McLovin and Mr. Arrested got into college and Belushi/Farley didn't which causes the major source of stress between the characters.
If you've seen the trailers you basically know the premise. One of the kids gets a fake ID and another learns about a party going on and says that they can get alcohol for the party. So the film is basically about getting alcohol for the party. Hijinks ensue. The end is a bit too much of a cliche that doesn't really work because there aren't enough jokes. Other than that though, the film is great.
seven thumbs up
He likes to draw dicks.
He wants to respect women.
He is McLovin
I think that most guys can see themselves in the characters -- perhaps arguing over which one they are more like. The kid from Arrested Development is the most likable with the McLovin playing the typical nerd and the other kid doing his best Belushi/Farley impression. It is the final days of high school and McLovin and Mr. Arrested got into college and Belushi/Farley didn't which causes the major source of stress between the characters.
If you've seen the trailers you basically know the premise. One of the kids gets a fake ID and another learns about a party going on and says that they can get alcohol for the party. So the film is basically about getting alcohol for the party. Hijinks ensue. The end is a bit too much of a cliche that doesn't really work because there aren't enough jokes. Other than that though, the film is great.
seven thumbs up
He likes to draw dicks.
He wants to respect women.
He is McLovin
Apparently this is going to be remade by the guy who does the TV show Prison Break, but I can't really imagine it will have half the impact that this German version does. Prove me wrong, Hollywood. Prove me wrong.
The film is based on a book which is, in turn, based on the famous Stanford Prison Experiment in which people volunteered for a study and were randomly assigned as either guards or prisoners. I'm kind of curious about the book because the film, at least 75% of it, is based on what actually happened during the Prison Experiment (which you can read about at the link above). So how much is from the book and how much is directly from the experiment. Unfortunately, the book seems to only be in German with no English translation. My German isn't nearly good enough to read an entire book.
So in the film, as in the actual experiment, once people are organized into prisoners and guards, everyone starts to play their role quite authentically. While the actual experiment didn't go as far as the film, it is still quite disturbing. We like to think that we could remember that "It's all just pretend" but if the people in the experiment couldn't why would we?
Part of the power of the film also comes from the fact that this was made Germans and can pretty easily be seen as a commentary on how easy it was for many Germans to fall into the atrocities that they committed during WWII. A Hollywood version wouldn't have as much power because of that and I doubt that a Hollywood film would take on a topic that would be nearly as powerful for those of us in the USA.
One thing I'm not sure about is if the name of the main character is supposed to be important. The character's name is Tarek Fahd which doesn't sound like a German name to me. This made me wonder if he was supposed to be a German of Middle Eastern decent. German like other European countries has had a number of Middle Eastern immigrants. Tarek is not only the one that resists the most but is also the one that is persecuted the most. So if he is supposed to be of Middle Eastern decent it might be significant. Or it could be a German name that just doesn't sound very German. The Herberts, Heinefelts, Westerfields, and such in my family are REAL German names!
There were a couple of times in which non-diagetic music was used and I think that was a mistake. It would have been better without it and would have helped to create more of a sense of realism. There's also a short afterward that wasn't really needed and there's one scene near the end which involves a bit of camera framing deception to create a reaction in the viewer that I thought was cheap and irritating. Other than that, the film is really really good.
seven thumbs up
Go direct to jail
leave your underwear at home
and do not pass go
The film is based on a book which is, in turn, based on the famous Stanford Prison Experiment in which people volunteered for a study and were randomly assigned as either guards or prisoners. I'm kind of curious about the book because the film, at least 75% of it, is based on what actually happened during the Prison Experiment (which you can read about at the link above). So how much is from the book and how much is directly from the experiment. Unfortunately, the book seems to only be in German with no English translation. My German isn't nearly good enough to read an entire book.
So in the film, as in the actual experiment, once people are organized into prisoners and guards, everyone starts to play their role quite authentically. While the actual experiment didn't go as far as the film, it is still quite disturbing. We like to think that we could remember that "It's all just pretend" but if the people in the experiment couldn't why would we?
Part of the power of the film also comes from the fact that this was made Germans and can pretty easily be seen as a commentary on how easy it was for many Germans to fall into the atrocities that they committed during WWII. A Hollywood version wouldn't have as much power because of that and I doubt that a Hollywood film would take on a topic that would be nearly as powerful for those of us in the USA.
One thing I'm not sure about is if the name of the main character is supposed to be important. The character's name is Tarek Fahd which doesn't sound like a German name to me. This made me wonder if he was supposed to be a German of Middle Eastern decent. German like other European countries has had a number of Middle Eastern immigrants. Tarek is not only the one that resists the most but is also the one that is persecuted the most. So if he is supposed to be of Middle Eastern decent it might be significant. Or it could be a German name that just doesn't sound very German. The Herberts, Heinefelts, Westerfields, and such in my family are REAL German names!
There were a couple of times in which non-diagetic music was used and I think that was a mistake. It would have been better without it and would have helped to create more of a sense of realism. There's also a short afterward that wasn't really needed and there's one scene near the end which involves a bit of camera framing deception to create a reaction in the viewer that I thought was cheap and irritating. Other than that, the film is really really good.
seven thumbs up
Go direct to jail
leave your underwear at home
and do not pass go
This was one of my favorites growing up. It would show up on television once every couple of years on a Saturday afternoon and I would always watch it. This started out as a student film of John Carpenter and
Dan O'Bannon. Carpenter would of course go on to do Halloween, Escape from New York and lots of other films. O'Bannon would go on to write Total Recall, Lifeforce and a little film called Alien.
In many ways Dark Star is the prequel or rough draft of Alien. Sure it is sort of a comedy, but there aren't really any jokes in it. It kind of stands in between the sparkling clean sterile vision of the future seen in 2001 to the dirty, cramped, lived in feeling of Alien. The movie starts with a very 2001-esque communication from Earth in which a formal and proper military person talks to the crew of the Dark Star ship. He talks about how the ship is so far away that it takes 10 years for the message to get to them. Some generic talk about the mission. Oh and that radiation shielding you wanted? You aren't going to get it. Then we move from the world where everything is regulated and it works to the dysfunctional world of the Dark Star. The crew all has bears and dingy overalls. The quarters are cramped. The ship is falling apart (part of it is off limits because of the failed radiation shielding).
The Dark Star is supposed to be out exploring solar systems for possible colonization, alien life forms, and destroying any planets which may be dangerous. But mainly they are just blowing up planets. They have given up on looking for life after the last time the computer told them a planet might have intelligent life and all the found was an inflatable beach ball with flippers. (and because this started out as a student film, it really is just a beach ball!) The captain is dead, one of the crew spends all his time up in a glass dome looking at the stars, and another one is some guy that just happened to be around when the real crew member went crazy and killed himself prior to takeoff.
There isn't much of a plot. There is a vignette with one of the crew members chasing around the beachball creature. Then the main story is a talking bomb that is going to explode while still attached to the ship and one of the crew has to use phenomenology to keep the bomb from exploding. However, the story is really about boredom, people stuck in crappy jobs, and alienation.
seven thumbs up
talking bombs are bad
they always get the last word
even out in space
In many ways Dark Star is the prequel or rough draft of Alien. Sure it is sort of a comedy, but there aren't really any jokes in it. It kind of stands in between the sparkling clean sterile vision of the future seen in 2001 to the dirty, cramped, lived in feeling of Alien. The movie starts with a very 2001-esque communication from Earth in which a formal and proper military person talks to the crew of the Dark Star ship. He talks about how the ship is so far away that it takes 10 years for the message to get to them. Some generic talk about the mission. Oh and that radiation shielding you wanted? You aren't going to get it. Then we move from the world where everything is regulated and it works to the dysfunctional world of the Dark Star. The crew all has bears and dingy overalls. The quarters are cramped. The ship is falling apart (part of it is off limits because of the failed radiation shielding).
The Dark Star is supposed to be out exploring solar systems for possible colonization, alien life forms, and destroying any planets which may be dangerous. But mainly they are just blowing up planets. They have given up on looking for life after the last time the computer told them a planet might have intelligent life and all the found was an inflatable beach ball with flippers. (and because this started out as a student film, it really is just a beach ball!) The captain is dead, one of the crew spends all his time up in a glass dome looking at the stars, and another one is some guy that just happened to be around when the real crew member went crazy and killed himself prior to takeoff.
There isn't much of a plot. There is a vignette with one of the crew members chasing around the beachball creature. Then the main story is a talking bomb that is going to explode while still attached to the ship and one of the crew has to use phenomenology to keep the bomb from exploding. However, the story is really about boredom, people stuck in crappy jobs, and alienation.
seven thumbs up
talking bombs are bad
they always get the last word
even out in space
When I said, "I want to be Christian Bale" I meant I wanted to have the body he had in American Psycho, not the one he has in The Machinist. I know it has been said to death, but Bale is incredibly scary skinny in this. There's one point where his character's call girl/girlfriend mentions it and he sucks his stomach (even further) in and he looks like the guy from Aphex Twin's "Come to Daddy" video.
My dad (who is not skinny) is a machinist, so the parts of the film where Bale's character is at work were of particular interest to me. However, I've been to where he works and it isn't anywhere as tedious or grim as the machine shop in this film. In the film the place where Bale works seems to be some kind of manufacturing place with multiple shifts. While there is some parts manufacturing where my dad works he mainly seems to make machines for factories.
At any rate, the fact that the main character in the film is blue collar was something I liked about the film. There are way too many movies and tv shows about white collar and upper class people. I'm an academic, but I like to think that I'm like J-Lo and I remember where I came from (and I have ass for days).
I'm hesitant to say too much about the film because that might ruin it. So if you ain't seen it, skip this part....
In a lot of ways this film is like Fight Club. However, comparing the two is kind of hard because they are about different things. Fight Club is has a lot of white collar angst (boo hoo, life in a cubicle is hard...) The machinist is, as I've said, working class. However, I think one of the things that really sets them apart for me is that Fight Club is really about finding someone to love and The Machinist is about guilt.
One one hand I really hated the Fight Club ended up basically being a love story. On the other hand Fincher is a much better director than Brad Anderson. Fincher makes Fight Club so stylish it is good to watch just on that alone. As good as the Machinist is, I don't think it has the replay value that Fight Club has. If Fincher had directed the Machinist and Anderson had directed Fight Club, I think the Machinist would be the best hands down.
That lack of stylish direction is one of the biggest strikes against it. If the direction was more stylish, I can easily see this being a movie that would stick with you a lot longer than The Machinist does. I compared Bale's look to that of the Aphex Twin video. Can you imagine what it would be like if he had directed it? Wow. That would have been awesome. So as it is, The Machinist was a pretty good film.
Seven Thumbs up.
Mad props to Christian
Someone give him a sandwich
'Cause Bale gotta eat!
My dad (who is not skinny) is a machinist, so the parts of the film where Bale's character is at work were of particular interest to me. However, I've been to where he works and it isn't anywhere as tedious or grim as the machine shop in this film. In the film the place where Bale works seems to be some kind of manufacturing place with multiple shifts. While there is some parts manufacturing where my dad works he mainly seems to make machines for factories.
At any rate, the fact that the main character in the film is blue collar was something I liked about the film. There are way too many movies and tv shows about white collar and upper class people. I'm an academic, but I like to think that I'm like J-Lo and I remember where I came from (and I have ass for days).
I'm hesitant to say too much about the film because that might ruin it. So if you ain't seen it, skip this part....
In a lot of ways this film is like Fight Club. However, comparing the two is kind of hard because they are about different things. Fight Club is has a lot of white collar angst (boo hoo, life in a cubicle is hard...) The machinist is, as I've said, working class. However, I think one of the things that really sets them apart for me is that Fight Club is really about finding someone to love and The Machinist is about guilt.
One one hand I really hated the Fight Club ended up basically being a love story. On the other hand Fincher is a much better director than Brad Anderson. Fincher makes Fight Club so stylish it is good to watch just on that alone. As good as the Machinist is, I don't think it has the replay value that Fight Club has. If Fincher had directed the Machinist and Anderson had directed Fight Club, I think the Machinist would be the best hands down.
That lack of stylish direction is one of the biggest strikes against it. If the direction was more stylish, I can easily see this being a movie that would stick with you a lot longer than The Machinist does. I compared Bale's look to that of the Aphex Twin video. Can you imagine what it would be like if he had directed it? Wow. That would have been awesome. So as it is, The Machinist was a pretty good film.
Seven Thumbs up.
Mad props to Christian
Someone give him a sandwich
'Cause Bale gotta eat!
This movie kicks ass. If you can see the trailer and not think that, then you and I have nothing in common. Stop reading this blog.
The good news is that the film lives up to the trailer. The bad news is there's some lame subplot with the king's wife back home and some traitor. I'm guessing they put it in to give some contrast to the fighting and to be able to give the viewer some breathing room between fights. However, it doesn't go anywhere, and it is boring.
There is lots of blood and amputations of all kinds. Like Sin City there are scenes that are taken directly from the comic. Unlike Sin City, they kind of tend to stick out and don't flow with the rest of the film all that well.
There's some debate over the meaning of the film. The Spartans talk about freedom constantly and how the Persians use slaves to fight. So some would say that we are meant to be the Spartans. But the Persians are the superior invading force and seen as decadent with the leader thinking he is divine. So some think that we are meant to be the Persians. I don't think it is an easy allegory. I would bet that creator Frank Miller sees the USA as more like the Spartans, but despite all their talk of freedom they are led by a king, and we learn that anyone who isn't seen as perfect is killed. The Spartan King is also called a barbarian and a madman because he kills the Persian diplomat. So regardless of their fighting ability, the Spartans don't seem very nice.
The film has a great look. The fights are pretty good, although the logic of the fighting style is a bit suspect. After all they are in this narrow pass so that the Persians will be in a bottleneck, but the Spartans keep leaving the pass. Doesn't that kind of eliminate the whole point of why them met them there? There is also the fact that the Persians seem to fight mainly with the Kung Fu style of only sending a few people at a time while the superior numbers just stand around and watch the outnumbered enemy nibble away at them. Finally, while the look is great, and there are some neat effects with speedups and slowdowns, with the exception of the images from Frank Miller, the direction isn't that great. It was a great achievement to get the film made but the direction is pretty bland. This is evident especially in the scenes back in Sparta with the wife and traitor when there isn't as much Frank Miller to draw from.
Seven thumbs up
Spartans love freedom
Or so I've heard a few times.
Just shut up and fight.
The good news is that the film lives up to the trailer. The bad news is there's some lame subplot with the king's wife back home and some traitor. I'm guessing they put it in to give some contrast to the fighting and to be able to give the viewer some breathing room between fights. However, it doesn't go anywhere, and it is boring.
There is lots of blood and amputations of all kinds. Like Sin City there are scenes that are taken directly from the comic. Unlike Sin City, they kind of tend to stick out and don't flow with the rest of the film all that well.
There's some debate over the meaning of the film. The Spartans talk about freedom constantly and how the Persians use slaves to fight. So some would say that we are meant to be the Spartans. But the Persians are the superior invading force and seen as decadent with the leader thinking he is divine. So some think that we are meant to be the Persians. I don't think it is an easy allegory. I would bet that creator Frank Miller sees the USA as more like the Spartans, but despite all their talk of freedom they are led by a king, and we learn that anyone who isn't seen as perfect is killed. The Spartan King is also called a barbarian and a madman because he kills the Persian diplomat. So regardless of their fighting ability, the Spartans don't seem very nice.
The film has a great look. The fights are pretty good, although the logic of the fighting style is a bit suspect. After all they are in this narrow pass so that the Persians will be in a bottleneck, but the Spartans keep leaving the pass. Doesn't that kind of eliminate the whole point of why them met them there? There is also the fact that the Persians seem to fight mainly with the Kung Fu style of only sending a few people at a time while the superior numbers just stand around and watch the outnumbered enemy nibble away at them. Finally, while the look is great, and there are some neat effects with speedups and slowdowns, with the exception of the images from Frank Miller, the direction isn't that great. It was a great achievement to get the film made but the direction is pretty bland. This is evident especially in the scenes back in Sparta with the wife and traitor when there isn't as much Frank Miller to draw from.
Seven thumbs up
Spartans love freedom
Or so I've heard a few times.
Just shut up and fight.
I saw this as a kid and remembered the basic plot of it, that a man had dreams that could change the world, but for the longest time I couldn't remember the name of it. It turns out that this version was actually made by PBS (with a very low budget to go along with that) and was only aired once. Until recently it had never been released on video or dvd because it contains a Beatles song and they couldn't get the rights. How I ever saw this weird little show is beyond me.
So going into rewatching this I've got a lot of sentimental attachment to this memory of the show. Luckily, it actually holds up pretty well to my memory even though it is strangely different than I remember it being.
As I said the movie is about a man who has dreams that change the world. As the movie starts he has tried to kill himself because he couldn't stand the responsibility of such a power. He is failed and sentenced to psychiatry. The psychiatrist is a specialist in dream and has a machine for inducing REM sleep. Because the changes that his dreams cause are retroactive, the psychiatrist doesn't seem to remember the changes that happen. Slowly, however, the main character begins to think that the psychiatrist is aware and is using his power not only to make the psychiatrist more powerful and important but to also make drastic changes to the world.
Because the movie is dealing with dreams, the unconscious is in charge and so the instructions of the psychiatrist aren't always carried out in the most logical way. For example, in one of the first sessions the main character is told to make it stop raining and when he wakes up it turns out that it hasn't rained there in over two years. In another he is told to dream about world peace and he dreams about the world uniting against an alien invasion. As the film goes on the setting is changed over and over again.
As I alluded to earlier, while the plot is the same as I remember it and I really enjoyed the film this time, it is also pretty different than I remember. One of those differences are the aforementioned aliens. While they don't play a very large part it is odd that I don't remember there being any aliens in the movie at all. Another change is when the main character describes the first time a dream changed the world is when he dreamed him aunt died in a car wreck. I remembered it happening when he was a fairly young kid but he is actually said to be 17. The largest difference is that there is an opening sequence that drastically changes the film and is referred to again near the end and I don't remember that at all. In that case it very well may be that when I saw it I was entirely too young to understand the twist that the opening is setting up, but it is just odd to see a movie that I thought I remembered so distinctly be so different from those memories.
seven thumbs up.
Weird PBS film
Remember the dream weaver
You just blew my mind
So going into rewatching this I've got a lot of sentimental attachment to this memory of the show. Luckily, it actually holds up pretty well to my memory even though it is strangely different than I remember it being.
As I said the movie is about a man who has dreams that change the world. As the movie starts he has tried to kill himself because he couldn't stand the responsibility of such a power. He is failed and sentenced to psychiatry. The psychiatrist is a specialist in dream and has a machine for inducing REM sleep. Because the changes that his dreams cause are retroactive, the psychiatrist doesn't seem to remember the changes that happen. Slowly, however, the main character begins to think that the psychiatrist is aware and is using his power not only to make the psychiatrist more powerful and important but to also make drastic changes to the world.
Because the movie is dealing with dreams, the unconscious is in charge and so the instructions of the psychiatrist aren't always carried out in the most logical way. For example, in one of the first sessions the main character is told to make it stop raining and when he wakes up it turns out that it hasn't rained there in over two years. In another he is told to dream about world peace and he dreams about the world uniting against an alien invasion. As the film goes on the setting is changed over and over again.
As I alluded to earlier, while the plot is the same as I remember it and I really enjoyed the film this time, it is also pretty different than I remember. One of those differences are the aforementioned aliens. While they don't play a very large part it is odd that I don't remember there being any aliens in the movie at all. Another change is when the main character describes the first time a dream changed the world is when he dreamed him aunt died in a car wreck. I remembered it happening when he was a fairly young kid but he is actually said to be 17. The largest difference is that there is an opening sequence that drastically changes the film and is referred to again near the end and I don't remember that at all. In that case it very well may be that when I saw it I was entirely too young to understand the twist that the opening is setting up, but it is just odd to see a movie that I thought I remembered so distinctly be so different from those memories.
seven thumbs up.
Weird PBS film
Remember the dream weaver
You just blew my mind
