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i mean, im all for adaptation and shit and changing things for a better cinematic flow but when you change a character from the comics so much that she isnt even the same character anymore, just make her a different goddamn character. (moria now an american cia agent and not a scottish doctor.) oh and please follow your own internal film lore ok, it just throws you out of the loop when you ignore what you've established already in the film series.
And every moment the beastified Beast was onscreen was tragic. Never thought I'd miss Kelsey Grammar.
On the whole, it was a solid flick (particularly in the quieter moments), but there was some truly wild oscillation between wonderful period production design and gaudy, cut-rate execution.
Edit: I'd like to imagine at least 25 million went to Michael Ironside just because everyone opposite his side of the table was terrified to say "no."
And at some point I definitely have to check out Pasolini's Gospel According to St. Matthew. I love the idea of a gay lapsed Catholic turned Marxist doing the other spiritual, respectful Jesus movie.
This is pretty much how I feel about it. It's like two different movies smushed together. Chuck and Eric in the swinging 60s ? Awesome. We need to form a team of teenagers with attitude to fight bad dudes whose plan makes no sense? Not so much.
I'm an atheist, and I thought it was an amazing film. But it's precisely because Jesus is portrayed as a fallible and imperfect human that it works so well; it's a powerful and human story. Note that I'm an atheist that has long held that the universe is far more miraculous as a stand-alone system without the guidance of a creator than it is with; when you remove the supernatural explanations from phenomena and behavior, they are far more astounding and amazing and wonderful. A man named Jesus that suffers these trials is a tragic hero, one I may not entirely agree with on all things, but one that I can empathize with and respect deeply. This kind of movie is right up my alley.
Steam: DigitalArcanist | XBoxLive: DigitalArcanist | PSN: DigitalArcanist | Backloggery: Houn
This is among the reasons I'm really disappointed the Paradise Lost film collapsed. I would have loved to see how a variety of audiences, secular and religious, responded to it.
Haven't seen the movie, but at least from the Catholic perspective Jesus being ... maybe not fallible, but certainly emotional and human is what's taught.
Considering Scorcese is/was Catholic, I'd bet whatever view is expressed in the film is influenced by that.
Steam: DigitalArcanist | XBoxLive: DigitalArcanist | PSN: DigitalArcanist | Backloggery: Houn
Spoilers for the movie:
Scorsese certainly subverted conventional thinking when the kind little girl that speaks intermittently with Jesus, who most people likely thought was a projection of his psyche or an angle/God, turns out to be Satan him(her?)self. As well, the second lead of the film is Harvey Keitel as Judas, a typically villainous role, and here he's played as Jesus' most stalwart and trusted ally.
There are several things about the Gospels that don't add up, but the biggie is how all of these villains line up against Jesus to conspire and bring him down (the Pharisees, the Romans, Pilate, Judas, Satan) when the actual goal all along was for Jesus to meet the fate they brought down upon him. It's something that even major religious sects do a poor job of reconciling, and they almost uniformly continue to cast players like Judas and Pilate in a negative light even though those players are instrumental in the entire purpose of Jesus' existence, his martyrdom.
I felt that The Last Temptation of Christ was really the only work that successfully(ish) strove to put those pieces in a narrative order that make some kind of workable logic.
It almost felt like the structure of some of the more poorly done superhero flicks. Like Lisbeth needed an origin story, or something. And then at the end we get the little epilogue of her becoming a hojillionaire. I guess mostly it came off as a story about Mikal that thought it was a story about Lisbeth, if that makes sense.
Maddie: "I am not!"
Riley: "You're a marsupial!"
Maddie: "I am a placental mammal!"
Jesus Christ Superstar?
What. There was a movie.
That would be about correct.
The books are utterly mediocre-at-best novels that randomly became a huge phenomenon. Like so many other shit books before them.
Yep. You've summed it up pretty accurately.
It's a gilded turd.
Also, some blackhearted part of me revels a bit in the fact that allegedly Rooney Mara had a complete freakout at the Academy Awards when she didn't win.
I mean, I liked her in that movie, but her role was almost entirely performed by her physical appearance and script exposition. She definitely didn't deserve a spot on the list.
Lots, I imagine.
Fox doesn't even want their third-tier properties to revert, which is why we're going to keep seeing reboots of Daredevil and Fantastic Four until people stop watching them.
Marvel still gets a pretty substantial cut on the licensing, and their agreements are pretty limited as far as how they can be used. Like, Sony just can't up and diversify their Spider-Man portfolio by creating new characters owned by Sony; likewise, Marvel can continue to license Spidey merch outside the scope of whatever Sony is doing and not have to give Sony a cut.
It's not really in Marvel's financial interest to remove viable, profitable properties away from other studios. They're getting a lot of money for very little work. The only person with a horse in that race would be Disney, and that's only if they're wanting to make a Cosmic Wars or Civil War-type movie.
Honestly, the only other Marvel property I'd like to see cross over into the Disneyverse is the FF, as I think they'd fit in perfectly with what they're doing already.
But I'd love to see a Marvel Knights movie, though. Blade, Punisher, AND Ghost Rider in the same flick? Fuckin' A.
(the other reason is I think Marvel has a better handle on their characters than the studios that current have them, and have less incentive to start over every six years. I wish I could say the same about WB and their DC properties).
Well, that's just because the DC division at Warners has its head completely up its ass.
It's not like Marvel's formula is mystical or inscrutable.
"Talent" + "Budget" + "People who give a shit" + "Respect for the property" = McDuck's Silo of Gold
Bravo, Ross. You win at forums.
Nadine Seksuel, Human Swashbuckler - Wyvern Watch DW
GM of [Deadlands: Reloaded] Coffin Rock
It's weird to me, because Warners definitely understood that formula with the Harry Potter series. Those books (and the scripts that were generated from them) are, to say politely, not so good. At least not from a narrative or cohesive standpoint.
But Warners said, "Like I fucking care," and spent $200 million on each film and filled them with 2 dozen BAFTA winners each and every time, and proceeded to make enough money to buy Nicaragua.
You don't need "talent" talent at every post (hello, David Yates and Mike Newell), but you need enough of it to cover your bases, and you certainly can't have big gaping gaps of it in key positions.
A lack of respect for the property leads to Catwoman.
Gary Ross, who many assumed would be directing the Hunger Games sequel, Catching Fire, has now officially quit the project, leveraging his success with the film into a undisclosed passion project with a different studio. This will leave Lionsgate with about 4 months to put the project through turnaround before production starts at the end of this summer.
I say, good riddance. I was not terribly impressed with the direction of that film.
And largely, Green Lantern.
They went to production with a lousy script and a director who just didn't give much of a crap. It was a shame, too, because it's a franchise with a ton of potential, and if I were Warners I'd be looking at trying to turn it around by half-way rebooting the franchise with Will Smith as John Stewart or Justin Timberlake as Guy Gardner.
It was yet another victim of the WB hierarchy's mentality of comic properties as "those things that we do to make the money." I don't know how you don't learn your lesson with The Dark Knight showing you how to do it right, but damned if they aren't stubborn.
Nadine Seksuel, Human Swashbuckler - Wyvern Watch DW
GM of [Deadlands: Reloaded] Coffin Rock
With respect to their future properties, the chatter from WB immediately following The Dark Knight's success was largely to the effect of "Man, people really love this dark, gritty stuff. We're gonna make Superman more like that."
They've only ever known how to chase the market appeal of their last success, often with profound disinterest for the content of their IPs. WB isn't exactly unique in this respect, but it's not like many other studios let Batman become Batman and Robin in a mad dash to make the franchise more accessible to younger audiences. In that case, chasing the audiences led to a public backlash so bad that we needed to invent a new term for the storytelling maneuver necessary to bring Batman back from the dead.
And "vision". Without a guy like Fiege in charge they'd have been more likely to fail with a combined universe.
IIRC J.K. Rowling had enormous control on what happened behind the scenes. DCE does not have that power.
Catwoman... there is no relationship at all. I mean, fuck, they even changed Catwoman's name. (I do admire Halle Berry accepting the Razzie, though).
And speaking of Razzies, Adam Sandler won both the Worst Actor and Worst Actress razzies. And Jack & Jill won every other razzie, too.
While completely ignoring that Marvel has been knocking it out with happy, fun, clever superhero movies like Iron Man and whatnot.
With each inevitable failure, Warners always reminds me of the TV programming robots from Futurama.
"Will this get those oily nerds off their calculators? If not, add more grimdark. They love the grimdark. Oh, and the edginess. Make with the edginess."
Also, I think this is easily one of the best credits sequences. Ever. Say what you will about the quality of the film itself, this bit is fucking gold.
I have a tumblr.
Check it out.
The same can be said for the Marvel Events in the comics.
"Oh, there's a huge crossover. Is it spring again already? *yawn*".
I don't really need Marvel films to feel like an event. I'm perfectly happy getting 1-3 films a year if they keep up with their current quality.
But I'm also a huge Marvel fan and am therefore biased.
Also: the Watchmen intro is the best.
All time.[/kanye]
But for realsy, the sheer volume of narrative information that is exchanged there is almost overwhelming, but handled so deftly and artfully.
Oh, fuck yes. Somehow, the full genius of the song pick didn't hit me until watching it again now -- obviously I got before that it was referencing the changing times from the Minutemen to the Watchmen and on, but somehow I missed that it could also be talking about the "changed times" of the alternate history established in the sequence as well.
I really want to go read the book again now.
I still don't know how I feel about the film. I think part of that has to do with the fact that I knew the source material so well prior to seeing the film that it's the kind of thing that really distorts your perception of how successful the film actually was. Much the same way fans of the books endlessly defend the not-so-good cinematic versions of the Harry Potter series and The Hunger Games, I'm not sure my objectivity is 100% intact, thanks to the film being so slavishly devoted to the material.
My favorite cut of the film is indeed the Ultimate Cut, which clocks in at almost 4 hours, and it's such an engaging and fascinating experience, but I'm so close to it I don't know if it's "good" or not anymore. It's definitely unlike just about anything else out there, and it's always gorgeous to look at.
Theoretically Evil
I'm an atheist but in church today (I work there), gospel of john reading, it is said that pilot isn't to be faulted as he was fulfilling a prophecy... but that judas is the real one to blame.
I started saying this as though I was disagreeing with you but I just realized it only emphasizes your point. especially since I believe it's only said in the one gospel.
I wasn't even a fan of the book until the movie was coming out and I sort of feel this way. I think it's phenomenal and I have watched it a lot. but when people ask me if it's good I find it really hard to reply.
Does your church use the Apostles' Creed? (aside: that would be an awesome/weird video game)
It's clear that on some level, Pilate has been vilified by the confederacy of Christians, which is so odd to me, considering how little a role Pilate had to play in any of it. He didn't give two shits about Jesus, it was much more a political conflict between the presiding Jewish leaders and the fracturing of their base.
Regardless, even if Judas gets most of the blame (and he does, as does Peter the Denying), none of that fits the narrative of Jesus dying for our collective sin as a predetermined act of martyrdom laid down by God Himself years before. If a martyr's whole purpose was being martyred (and divinely so), then how can we blame anyone for that result? Do we wish for some reason that Jesus had not been made to suffer and die? Without Judas (and Pilate, and Peter, and the Pharisees), Jesus is basically just a Ghandi beta model, and kind of a dick at that.