Wall-E was the best movie I've seen in a long, long time. Not only that, but it is one of the best movies I've ever seen (I'd put it in my top five). If you haven't yet had the pleasure of seeing it, I suggest you do. Wall-E is the only movie I've ever seen that I was still thinking about weeks later. I saw the movie over too weeks ago and will periodically find myself thinking of a scene from the movie or singing the numbers from 'Hello, Dolly'. It is nothing short of magical-- the characters, the styling, the emotion. Simply amazing.
It is a movie that works in so many different ways: as a love story, a sci-film, a moralistic tale, and many more. Each operates simultaneously and also seperately. It is a movie you can watch over and over and enjoy a different aspect. It is a nod to the past and a look to the future. The movie is essentially divided into three parts that cover loneliness, love, and redemption respectively (and each of those parts operate on many levels as well).
The plot is nothing Earth shattering in its originality, but the journey is. In the end, I cared more about the robots in this movie than just about any human character in any other movie. The emotion that the filmakers could generate from simple physicality, beautiful visuals, and music is incredible. This is why Pixar is the best movie studio these days. They care about so much more than the cheap joke, or dumbing down the movie for the kids, or making the movies that will make the most money-- they want to tell a great story with great characters and they hope the money will follow.
Pixar tries to raise the bar everytime they create a new film and do something orignal and exciting, whereas the other studios (ahem Dreamworks and Fox Studios) just use the cookie cutters. Just compare Toy Story 2 to Shrek 2 and you'll get the picture-- Toy Story was an incredible groundbreaking film and it was improved upon in nearly every fashion in the sequel. Pixar didn't just make a sequel to make more money, they only did once they had a story that warranted another movie. Shrek was a very funny movie and Shrek 2 was essentially the same movie. And such it was much less enjoyable the second time around. Then the dreck that was Shrek 3 came out and it just goes to show that every one invlovled is focused on making money (lets tell the same story with the same characters). It is good to see some people focus on the quality of a movie over the quantity of money it will produce.
The only reason the top ten computer animated films aren't all Pixar films is because they haven't yet made 10 films. They'll own the chart come next year.
Showing posts with label movies. Show all posts
Showing posts with label movies. Show all posts
Monday, July 21, 2008
Saturday, September 8, 2007
Superman Returns
Wow. If you've never seen Superman Returns, stop now, run, and make a note to never see that steaming pile of crap ever. And I thought Superman IV was bad.
This film takes itself way too seriously which is hard to do given the subject matter. There is no humor in the movie at all, they went fully for drama but fall flat on their face. Their is inherently no drama in the character of Superman. Instead of focusing on the action and humor side of things they try pathos. Not an easy task given an stoic invincible alien as a main character.
The plot boils down to this: Superman returns from space, Lex Luthor goes to Superman's Fortress of solitude and steals some crystals and knowledge of how to use them, he then steals some kryptonite, throws the kryptonite and crystals into the ocean and builds an kryptonite/crystal island slowly, fails to kill Superman when any moron could have, Superman throws island into space slowly. The End. I just saved you two and a half hours of your life.
Sure other pointless things happen-- albeit very slowly. The only action in the movies, aside from the slow scene of superman throwing the island into space slowly and then slowly falling back to the earth (which strangely results in a large impact crater even though he is only 225 pounds), revolves around plot points invented to fill time and to get Superman to do something. It happens in the same way as in a lot of other sci-fi movies, Armageddon springs to mind, where bad things happen for absolutely no reason (or even worse against logic). A Space Shuttle malfunctions slowly and drags a plane along with it slowly, a robbery happens slowly, the Daily Prophet globe falls slowly: all as a pretext so we can see Superman do something. This is a necessity since during the other over two hours nothing happens: no action, no plot, no character development (you know exactly who everyone is within 10 seconds of their appearance). This all leads to no fun.
You may have noticed the repetition of the word 'slow' in the above paragraphs. This is done on purpose as even when things happen they take in some weird relativistic space-- time slows down for the viewer. That's some good direction there, "Something is happening so lets slow everything down as to suck all excitement out of it. I don't want anything to get in the way of the pathos."
There are too many stupid things in the movie to list out so I will refrain, as you should refrain from watching it.
Look, up in the sky. It's a bird. It's a plane. It's a steaming pile of crap!
n.b. A quick check on IMDb gives the following bit of trivia: "Brandon Routh, Kate Bosworth and Kevin Spacey signed on without having read the script"... that explains a bit of it.
This film takes itself way too seriously which is hard to do given the subject matter. There is no humor in the movie at all, they went fully for drama but fall flat on their face. Their is inherently no drama in the character of Superman. Instead of focusing on the action and humor side of things they try pathos. Not an easy task given an stoic invincible alien as a main character.
The plot boils down to this: Superman returns from space, Lex Luthor goes to Superman's Fortress of solitude and steals some crystals and knowledge of how to use them, he then steals some kryptonite, throws the kryptonite and crystals into the ocean and builds an kryptonite/crystal island slowly, fails to kill Superman when any moron could have, Superman throws island into space slowly. The End. I just saved you two and a half hours of your life.
Sure other pointless things happen-- albeit very slowly. The only action in the movies, aside from the slow scene of superman throwing the island into space slowly and then slowly falling back to the earth (which strangely results in a large impact crater even though he is only 225 pounds), revolves around plot points invented to fill time and to get Superman to do something. It happens in the same way as in a lot of other sci-fi movies, Armageddon springs to mind, where bad things happen for absolutely no reason (or even worse against logic). A Space Shuttle malfunctions slowly and drags a plane along with it slowly, a robbery happens slowly, the Daily Prophet globe falls slowly: all as a pretext so we can see Superman do something. This is a necessity since during the other over two hours nothing happens: no action, no plot, no character development (you know exactly who everyone is within 10 seconds of their appearance). This all leads to no fun.
You may have noticed the repetition of the word 'slow' in the above paragraphs. This is done on purpose as even when things happen they take in some weird relativistic space-- time slows down for the viewer. That's some good direction there, "Something is happening so lets slow everything down as to suck all excitement out of it. I don't want anything to get in the way of the pathos."
There are too many stupid things in the movie to list out so I will refrain, as you should refrain from watching it.
Look, up in the sky. It's a bird. It's a plane. It's a steaming pile of crap!
n.b. A quick check on IMDb gives the following bit of trivia: "Brandon Routh, Kate Bosworth and Kevin Spacey signed on without having read the script"... that explains a bit of it.
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