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Originally posted by ikris:
Saw Sucker Punch; absolutely loved it. The soundtrack was amazing! I ordered it off cdnow literally within minutes of leaving the movie theatre. The cover of "Asleep" had my mouth on the floor.

Planning to see Battle: Los Angeles this coming weekend.

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Originally posted by Myy:
Sweet Dreams is the one I loveee. Did you know Emily browning ( babyDoll) actually sings that, and a few others.

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Bah, now I want to watch this again....grrr...

Yea I liked the movie...very odd...but also very good....still wish just once that they showed why she was so..hypnotic..

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Originally posted by Lord Crovax:
Bah, now I want to watch this again....grrr...

Yea I liked the movie...very odd...but also very good....still wish just once that they showed why she was so..hypnotic..

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I think this is very similar to Hamster Huey and the Big Kablooie...

Calvin and Hobbes was written by Bill Watterston who had references to two notable recurring themes in his strip that he never explicitly stated - "The Noodle Incident" (in which Calvin is presumably punished for his mischievous nature at school) and "Hamster Huey and the Big Kablooie" (Calvin's favorite bedtime storybook).

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Wikipedia:

He also makes a point of not showing certain things explicitly: the "Noodle Incident" and the children's book Hamster Huey and the Gooey Kablooie are left to the reader's imagination, where Watterson was sure they would be "more outrageous" than he could portray.

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Originally posted by yakusoku:
... Huey... Kablooie...

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Originally posted by Myy:
So, did you like the movie>? if so write a paragraph on what you liked and disliked. J/k, but please elaborate a little.

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SPOILERS AHEAD! You've been warned.

I liked the movie. Not enough to topple any of the films I would consider among the best, but enough so that I didn't feel like my time or ticket money was wasted. I feel like Snyder's films to begin with are very hit or miss with their audiences. I really liked Watchmen and I really did not like 300. I went with three other friends and I was on one end of the spectrum, really liking the entire film, one guy liked most of it, except for the end, one guy disliked most of it, but thought it had a few redeeming moments, and the fourth guy hated the film.

I think your expectations of what the movie will be color your experience. It's like eating at night with someone. If you haven't eaten lunch or dinner yet and your friend suggests the two of you get some ice cream, you may find it ultimately unsatisfying - it just wasn't steak and potatoes with green beans and an apple cobbler, which you really needed to satisfy your appetite. Your friend, having just eaten dinner, however, is fine with the ice cream as a sweet indulgence.

The trailer didn't seem to tease that it would be some great dramatic thriller with a suspenseful plot. A girl gets locked away and escapes her reality through fantasy, which includes fighting robots and dragons, wearing steampunk gear. It's like a bunch of anime series brought to life, just not as badly as they've done with Dragonball or Avatar the Airbender. The film was fun and entertaining, if you don't take it too seriously. It IS a rather shallow movie, despite Snyder's attempts to justify his work and proclaim it to be an uplifting girl power movie - which you *can* see if you really want to, because the four protagonists are all female, on the other hand, there are clearly gratuitous shots that aren't there to empower women. They're there because it's a nice visual. Emily Browning in a short skirt that she really has no business engaging in fights, flipping, jumping, and turning about doesn't demonstrate her ability to maintain her composure and remain ladylike in the odds of great peril - the short skirt just demonstrates she can look fierce shooting at things while showing some leg.

I took the film at face value, and despite the fact that there are three "layers" to the film, where she's situated in first an insane asylum, then a bordello, and finally in a fantasy world, the meaning is clear, that each layer is only there to juxtapose with the former one, that there are similarities that are hardly more complex than Dorothy going to Oz, and seeing people she knows from her world situated there. Only, this film leaves less to the audience's pondering as to the nature of the layers of reality that other films such as Total Recall or Inception make us wonder which is reality and which is dreaming, but the entertainment is in the visual wonder of the different worlds. In the bordello, we see the motivation for her fantasies, to escape from the hellish conditions where the only options seem to be to cooperate or die, to the point where rather than face the unseemly truth of using seduction to captivate her audience, she escapes to another world which acts as a living, moving metaphor for her struggles.

Only, that gives perhaps a little too much credit to the film. It's conveniently a way to explore different fantasy scenes, where they have to battle different enemies and find different treasures to ultimately reach their goal of escape. However tenuous this excuse may be, the fantasy scenes are incredible, and noted by most as the highlight of the movie (although admittedly by many the only enjoyable parts for them). I found all three worlds interesting, though. The bordello strings the fantasy scenes together and the asylum brings us back to reality and the motivation for the entire film. However, I think this is ultimately where it loses much of its audience. You root for Tim Robbins in Shawshank Redemption, because he is fighting against corruption and you want him to experience freedom. His success brings you joy. Rain Man, Children of Men, and Braveheart don't paint a perfect rosy happy ending like Wall-E, where everyone "good" succeeds and everyone "bad" is punished, but there is still a sense of hope and closure at the end for most audiences. Charlie says goodbye to his brother, but you still get the sense that he's found the family he's really wanted and changed who he is for having Raymond in his life. Wallace dies, but his followers still charge on, and Bruce redeems himself.

That's where Sucker Punch has a rather jarring ending when we're brought back to the asylum. She ultimately loses and many are left wondering, "What was the point in all that?" The characters went through all this trouble and we hope that by seeing Sweet Pea get on the bus, that everything is right. Only, none of that seems real. It's been a delusion and all her trials were really manifested in the asylum with real life failures and ultimately, it may seem pointless when she doesn't escape.

Only, the doctor notes that she seems to welcome it. She's found her escape, made her peace and found happiness in her sacrifice and can live out her life, despite what happens next. The will she had, to fight, to become a different person from the innocent waif we saw in the beginning of the movie is what the film tries to close on, mirroring the beginning, with the same narrator and voice-over talking to the audience. It really depends on what you consider to be a success and for the audience, what entertainment and a fulfilling experience really is. If you felt that the journey is wasted because the end destination wasn't where you thought you would be, then those people are going to feel cheated out of her escape. If you expected some deep, eerie twist from the end where we find out that all along, it wasn't really Babydoll, but Vera or Sweet Pea imagining her life, you won't get that either, but it does ground the movie and remind us that the fights she won, in the bordello and against the Nazi soldiers, Samurai warriors, and the dragon are what's important.

With apologies to those who would be horrified at the comparison, I liken it to Rocky I. Does it matter that Rocky lost the fight? Does it make the whole movie worthless? I don't think so. The journey to get there and ultimately prove that he was the kind of person who could stand the whole fight against a heavily favored opponent proved himself to the world that even in defeat, he's won a different kind of victory.

The fact that so many people wanted to see Babydoll win, to escape, means that they weren't interpreting the title of the movie itself correctly. A sucker punch is an unexpected (and often deemed as "cheap") hit on another person in fight, or worse to another person not expecting a fight. The ending is meant to be jarring and unsettle you from your normally happy experience when we hear the final crack that signifies that the lobotomy went through. WE are being hit with a sucker punch. Babydoll is oddly calm at witnessing what is about to happen to her.

Or, another way to view it is that Babydoll comes off as an innocent young woman who turns out to be a force of nature and surprises Blue, and the doctor in the asylum so that both are caught off guard, hit by a sucker punch.

All that being written, the main attraction is the visceral feel of the movie. This is the ultimate video for Bjork's "Army of Me" that is way better than the original. "Tomorrow Never Knows" is oddly melancholy and haunting when you can associate that this is the turning point when you feel that they all are about to pull this off to when the whole plan comes undone and Blue delivers his own sucker punch to the girls.

I also believe that the end result is very similar to 300, except, with 300 you already knew what the end result was going to be. So you Accepted it and that's why it didn't bother you when you saw the final battle end in failure. In this movie, no one was expecting this ending and so they felt "cheated". "you" referring to one-self

I really did like the message. all the fighting, DID have a purpose. It wasn't babydoll's destiny to emerge victorious, but to be the catalyst for something greater. her sacrifice saved the girls, and we can assume that caused Sweet Pea's journey begin.

Tom Hardy as Bane for The Dark Knight Rises.

Super 8

I highly recommend this one. It reminds me of a ton of movies from my childhood, such as E.T., Goonies, etc. It also reminds me of Cloverfield and other sci-fi movies.

See it!

Best DVD I've seen in a while was...

Moon

Sam Worthington was great in this. It reminds me of old 70's sci-fi that I totally love. Totally worth the rental.

Especially the scene when ''Tiptoe Through The Tulips'' starts playing in the ''happy'' house :|

3 only movies that gave me shivers:

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Originally posted by MasterWolf:
Harry Potter. Awesome. That is all.

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I had pretty mixed opinions of it until the final 2o minutes or so, when the film committed (IMO) a couple of pretty big fumbles.

First of all, whose idea was it to turn Voldemort's death into a pointless orgy of CGI? Was the technical director seized by the worst spirit of George Lucas and said "no, instead of just settling for a normal death and letting the significance stand on its own, considering we've already established this fellow as The Big Bad, or even going with an Obi-Wan Kenobi-style disappear leaving only his cloak, let's have him peel off into ash and float away on the wind for no given reason!"

The epilogue also dropped the ball, I felt, again in the effects department. I'm sorry, but they did not look like they were 36ish. Emma Watson looked like she was 25, Rupert and Daniel looked like 30 year olds with 5 o'clock shadows. Bonnie Wright (and I mean this as a compliment) managed to look appropriately old enough. So yeah, that really drew me out of it. I guess when you blow all your budget on making the villain's death look like a really metal anti-dandruff shampoo ad you work with what you've got.

The latter half of the film especially (once Voldemort begins his assault on Hogwarts) suffered heavily from the same thing that brought down part one, as well as Watchmen and so many other film adaptations, which is to say that they adhered far too closely to the source material. Now obviously the basic plot should stay the same, but film and books are very different mediums for a reason, with vastly different pacing and techniques for telling a story. Simply cutting and pasting makes the film feel like a piece of cardboard; events happen from Point A to Point B, with no room to breathe or act or take a more natural pace. It feels less like a climax and more like a checklist, in other words. And that's a shame, because it doesn't have to be that way. I think adaptations are at their best when they rise above merely sufficiently translating the plot to screen (any fool can do that); it's the little flourishes that bring life back into the beast. And that's no exception for this one.

Little visual things like the enchanted leaves in Snape's memories with Lilly, or how memories transition in the pensieve, or even little homages like the pixies in the room of requirement. And then the bigger stuff. Much like Watchmen, the best parts of the Deathly Hallows part two were the ones where the director took liberties and soared. For Watchmen, I think this was best represented by the altering of Rorshach's backstory and his relationship with the prison psychologist. While definitely more brutal and stomach-churning, I feel the film (not to mention Jackie Earl Hayley's outstanding acting) did a much better job of emotionally depicting the transition from Walter Kovacs to... Rorshach. But I digress.

The highlight of the Deathly Hallows part two for me was the 10 or so minutes which began with Professor McGonagall getting absolutely medieval on Snape's ass and ended with the assault on Hogwarts by the death eaters and trolls. I don't recall there being a duel between the two wizards like that in the novel (IIRC, snape just fled), but it was oh so satisfying watching a livid Maggie Smith hand him his ass and free the school. It was also, I might add, much more satisfying than the showdown between Bellatrix and Molly Weasley, which was a colossal letdown from the thrilling scene in the book. I openly cheered when McGonagall began summoning the soldiers, and I think it was a smart choice to depict them as animated stone and masonry instead of empty suits of armor as they were in the book. It did a far better job of conveying the idea that Hogwarts was stirring to defend itself, with the upshot of being completely badass.

But I'm rambling.

Overall I'd give it a 6/10. Definitely not the best film of the series. And certainly not an inspiring send-off. I mean, I don't think there's a concluding shot that could have had the same beautiful closure as the final sentences of the novel, but it certainly could have been done better.

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Originally posted by Volcanon:
Was it less awful than 'Part I'? I'm being forced to watch it by my wife. Part I was insipidly boring.

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It's better than the first part for someone who hasn't read the novels and isn't invested in the series. It's basically a 2+ hour-long action movie with wands instead of guns. Loads of badass fighting, great fight choreography, and awesome special effects.

Oh, and for the first half-hour or so they slip in a lot of fanservice in the form of Emma Watson's cleavage, if you're into that sort of thing.

It may be a bit hard to follow if you've not read the novels, but since your approach seems to be less about engaging with the story and more surviving the encounter with maximum enjoyment, I doubt that would bother you much.

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Originally posted by speechjew:
http://www.superherohype.com/news/articles/168594-the-trailer-for-the-avengers-is-her e

you're welcome

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I really wanted to like this one but it suffered from some flaws:

- Performances were weak. Seriously, you're spending millions making a movie, hire people that can act. Even Mary Elizabeth Winstead was not believable in this. Most of the actors didn't even show any terror on their faces when seeing people getting killed. Everyone is just standing around talking instead of freaking out? Heh. Only Kristofer Hivju seemed believable to me with his wide open eyes--like WTF am I seeing?!

- The special effects of the thing itself were not as good as the 1982 movie of the same name. The computer generated thing looked more like it belonged in a video game. The 1982 version was totally better in this regard.

- It's a remake. Hollywood, STOP REMAKING MOVIES! I know it TECHNICALLY is a prequel to John Carpenter's excellent movie. But, seriously, it tells the same story, the characters go through the same trials, they come up with a "test", it is among us, etc. It's a remake. Only, it doesn't end with the same ambiguity as the 1982 movie. Nothing new to see here, move along kids.

- I was glad to see that they hooked the two movies together. However, it was lame how they spliced the end of the story into the end credits. The cuts were jarring. This would have worked better just being shown with the credits rolling over the footage.

I suppose, if the 1982 version didn't exist I would rate this one higher. But it does exist... so disappointed in this movie.

At least I saw it at the matinee, so I'm only out $5.50.

Oh, and the whole Christ/Pulp Fiction thing? Total waste of 2 minutes.

The best part of the movie is Jude Law, again. He's wonderful. And Stephen Fry is great as Sherlock's brother.

6/10

Why couldn't they have stopped at 1?

Atlas Shrugged: Part I (2011)

I give it a 5/10 and I'm being generous.

Atlas Shrugged is my favorite book, so I'm on board with the ideas presented.

The problem here is execution. The movie raced through the material without giving the motivations behind the actions. The casting was a joke. The acting was poor. The special effects weren't very "special". Overall, the movie was embarrassing.

In my opinion, it was a mistake to try to make this story into a movie. It should have been done as a mini-series at least... possibly a full-on TV series that ran for 5 years.

I cannot recommend this movie.

The last time I can remember a movie this poorly done with such rich source material was The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (2005) and Battlefield Earth (2000). Both of which I rated 4/10.

April - The Three Stooges Movie
May - Men in Black 3

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