Forum

Welcome Guest 

Show/Hide Header

Welcome Guest, posting in this forum requires registration.





Pages: [1] 2
Author Topic: Can someone clear something up for me?
Guest
Minion of Jabootu
Posts: 147
Permalink
Post Can someone clear something up for me?
on: March 24, 2012, 15:24
Quote

I'm curious about the TRANSFORMERS feature films (the recent live action ones, not the animated feature from the 80's).

I remain a bit puzzled by the disdain many seem to have for the films. They made tons of money -or at least sold tons of tickets- (and thus referencing them in the preview for BATTLESHIP would seem a wise move for the studio), and are decent escapist entertainment. They're overlong. They're not QUO VADIS or anything, but to my knowledge they never tried to be anything of that caliber. The films aren't great or anything, but I recall them as being pretty good turn-off-your-brain-and-just-enjoy-the-ride affairs. What gives?
Rock

Petoht
Thrall of Jabootu
Posts: 83
Permalink
Post Re: Can someone clear something up for me?
on: March 24, 2012, 22:07
Quote

The biggest problem I had with them was the insistence on focusing on the humans, and the shaky-cam for the fights. In the first, it was incredibly difficult to tell what was going on when the robots where fighting, and when they weren't fighting, I just didn't care.

I don't want to watch the Sam Witwicky Show. I want to watch giant alien robots.

Capt_Nemo
Thrall of Jabootu
Posts: 81
Permalink
Post Re: Can someone clear something up for me?
on: March 24, 2012, 23:26
Quote

I noticed a phenomenon where there seems to be a belated backlash to films that make a lot of money.

What you have said about Transformers could also apply to Avatar or Pearl Harbor.

The tone these arguments take seem to verge on You-people-who-paid-lots-of-good-money-to-see-this-crap-were-dupes-and-I-will-show-you-the-error-of-your-ways.

It may have something to do with the check-your-brain-at-the-door mentality you outlined. When people re-engage their brains, they love to point to the flaws with friends afterward.

Movies that are cut from the same cloth and manage to thrive seem to have actors that can give the movie gravitas. For example, Big Trouble in Little China is an excellent example of tune-out-from-reality movie-making. But who's willing to bash Jack Burton or Egg Shen?

Guest
Minion of Jabootu
Posts: 147
Permalink
Post Re: Can someone clear something up for me?
on: March 25, 2012, 14:37
Quote

It's a weird time for the movies. What do you do when an industry built on escapist entertainment gets crucified for producing escapist entertainment?

You might have something, Cap. I'm reminded of PLANET OF THE APES, which centers on about the silliest concept you can have. But when you've got Chuck Heston, Roddy McDowell, and Maurice Evens working the material (and in the sequels the likes of James Gregory and Claude Akins), it works, and it works well!

I will agree whole-heartedly about the shaking camera thing. It's gotten very tiresome, and it did so very quickly. Modern techniques have just reminded me of why I love movies from the 40s and 50s and 60s so much. Among other things, they'd hold the camera still enough for you to tell what's going on! They would also offer dialogue scenes that didn't require endless extreme close-ups.

Greenhorne-
t
Initiate of Jabootu
Posts: 31
Permalink
Post Re: Can someone clear something up for me?
on: March 25, 2012, 16:22
Quote

As for "turning off your brain", that involves the suspention of disbelief and too many film makers seem to DEMAND it. They have to make it worth our while! And Petoht is right about the "shakey cam", they are getting too cute with it; it makes it hard to get "into" the movie and pretend you're watching something that's actually happening.

By The Way, here's my problem with "Transformers:
FIRST MOVIE: Giant robots are fighting a world-wide battle!
SECOND MOVIE: Robots? what robots?

The "cover-up conspiracy" nonsense was (yet another) problem in the second Jurasic Park movie. The EEEVIL corporation wanted to exploit the dinosaurs by putting them on display, but at the same time they kept their existance a secret!

Terrahawk
Initiate of Jabootu
Posts: 14
Permalink
Post Re: Can someone clear something up for me?
on: March 25, 2012, 17:59
Quote

I also agree with Petoht. Someone in Hollywood needs to get back to filming action in a comprehensible way.

Rock, I think there is a difference between turning your brain off and getting lobotomized. Indiana Jones requires you turn your brain off, but the action, humor, and acting move along enough that you don't care. Any time I've tried to watch Transformers it's been so lacking in all three of those things so that all I can do is nitpick it. Star Trek is another recent film that moved enough to allow the brain to turn off (even with the horrendous lense flares).

I just rewatched Planet of the Apes on Netflix and was more impressed with it than I remembered. Yes, Heston added weight to the proceedings. But, there were some good interplays between several themes.

Aussiesmur-
f
Initiate of Jabootu
Posts: 8
Permalink
Post Re: Can someone clear something up for me?
on: March 25, 2012, 19:46
Quote

I remember Hitchcock's description of 'refridgerator movies'. Essentially, a movie succeeded if you didn't think about the flaws until afterwards, when you were getting a snack.

Jaws ia a classic example. One my favourite movies ever, but anyone with even a superficial knowledge of sharks can tell you that sharks simply do not act in any way similiar to that portrayed in the movie. For example, the idea that a great white would bite down on a SCUBA tank in the way shown is ridiculous. But the audience DOESN'T CARE because the movie is generally well-scripted, well-acted and well-directed.

By comparison, I remember watching Armageddon with my then-girlfriend, and driving her crazy with the number of times I pointed out ridiculous aspects of the movie.

With Transformers, I loved it in the 80s, and was mildly entertained by the first movie (partly because of Peter Cullen's callbacks to the cartoon series, such as "One shall stand. One shall fall."

Studios make their money by having a large number of people 'quite like' a movie, rather than a small number of people loving it. Appealling to a broad base is simply sound economics when your movie costs $150 million dollars to make + $50 million to market.

Guest
Minion of Jabootu
Posts: 147
Permalink
Post Re: Can someone clear something up for me?
on: March 26, 2012, 14:31
Quote

I don't know. If you're going into a movie about giant, intelligent, alien robots who disguise themselves as cars, suspension of disbelief is everything. I put it in the same category as something like Godzilla or Gammera, I already know it's pure fantasy so I really have no choice but coast through and enjoy the adventure (granted, Godzilla movies deliver more eye candy, but still).

Still, I mostly remember only the first film, which impressed me by actually having American soldiers who were GOOD GUYS! This in a big entertainment movie made during the BUSH administration! Otherwise, my biggest problem with the films as a whole (aside from how long they are, each should have been kept to around 80 minutes, maybe 90) was the comic relief characters. I hated them all. And, yeah, Sam is one of the most unappealing action heroes to ever have a feature film built around them, what with his constant wining about how life is so unfair. Had the focus of the series been more a John Wayne type, centering on the soldiers, then it would have been a better cycle. Overlooking all that, the series has at least proved entertaining, which is the ultimate point of ANY movie.

BoggyMan
Initiate of Jabootu
Posts: 2
Permalink
Post Re: Can someone clear something up for me?
on: March 26, 2012, 15:07
Quote

I've heard someone say that 'suspension of disbelief' is usually misused by Hollywood. Suspension of disbelieve only applies to the premise, not mechanics of the plot or universe.

For example, I can buy that vampires and werewolves exist. I can't believe that they both fall in love with the same vacant-eyed twit, have nature-based powers that break multiple laws of biology and physics, or would allow themselves to be lorded over by a group of effete cretins whom any group of 2 or more newborns could destroy at any time.

In Transformers, I can buy alien robots, but not them behaving like brutal racist caricatures. Thus the creator's admonition becomes 'turn of your brain', to which my reply is; "Hell no! It takes 3 cups of coffee to get the thing jump-started in the first place!"

Petoht
Thrall of Jabootu
Posts: 83
Permalink
Post Re: Can someone clear something up for me?
on: March 26, 2012, 22:10
Quote

Quote from Rock Baker on March 26, 2012, 14:31
I don't know. If you're going into a movie about giant, intelligent, alien robots who disguise themselves as cars, suspension of disbelief is everything.

Well, sure. But let's take the scene where Optimus and a couple others are talking to Sam through his bedroom window. When someone come to investigate, they hide behind trees instead of transforming into cars. You know, their main form of disguise? That was painfully stupid.

And that's not getting into giant robot balls, Amos and Andy... er, I mean, Skidz and Mudflap, and John Tuturo's ass.

Pages: [1] 2
Mingle Forum by cartpauj
Version: 1.0.34 ; Page loaded in: 0.028 seconds.