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Post by Scott on Aug 18, 2012 13:11:49 GMT -5
Even though he dropped out as the director, Del Toro was still involved in the script writing. I'm just going to wait and see with the movies. I liked Fellowship of the Ring, but not the other two LotR films. There's the potential for something I'll enjoy. I'll not be going in expecting a faithful adaptation, but just hoping to see a good fantasy movie. Speaking of Dracula, I read a rumor that Del Toro was going to be doing another Universal Monster remake, another version of Frankenstein.
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Post by geneweigel on Aug 18, 2012 14:10:36 GMT -5
I wasn't aware that he was still involved. That is ill news considering his tangential effect on the DON'T BE AFRAID OF THE DARK remake as writer and producer. The name-dropping of "Arthur Machen" throughout the DBATD film had me cringing and wincing in pain in its sheer lack of literacy.
P.S. This sort of illiterate writing reminded me of the film STEPHEN KING'S THE MANGLER where the hero uses Frazer's Golden Bough as if it was written by a wizard and is deadly in the wrong hands kind of magical object! I wanted to vomit blood watching that!
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Post by geneweigel on Aug 18, 2012 14:13:16 GMT -5
Note: in the short story THE MANGLER from "NIGHT SHIFT", King gives a brief mention of Frazer's Golden Bough but in no way like the film dumbly uses it.
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Post by Scott on Aug 28, 2012 9:25:01 GMT -5
I went to see ParaNorman in 3D on Saturday. There was a 3D trailer for the Hobbit. I wasn't aware that it was going to be in 3D. It looked great.
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Post by geneweigel on Nov 20, 2012 22:38:15 GMT -5
I've seen Gandalf on a bus about 100+ times this week and its weird that I'm kind of the opposite in reaction to it that I would have been lets say twenty years ago. I'm not saying the guy did a bad job as Gandalf but I think I would have liked a fresh start with someone more weird.
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Post by geneweigel on Nov 21, 2012 15:23:22 GMT -5
I've seen Gandalf on a bus about 100+ times this week and its weird that I'm kind of the opposite in reaction to it that I would have been lets say twenty years ago. I'm not saying the guy did a bad job as Gandalf but I think I would have liked a fresh start with someone more weird. I got one:
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Post by geneweigel on Dec 18, 2012 13:08:23 GMT -5
I didn't even want to go this weekend to see this but my Iphone "autocorrected" what I wrote to mean something else when my friend wrote me to ask if I was going and if it was any good. Get this: I would have just liked to go for the hell of it but its too much crap to do before Xmas ( Still haven't got the tree up) maybe next week or so.turned into with "autocorrect:. I would have to go for the hell of it but its too much crap to do before Xmas (Still haven't got the tree up) maybe next week or so.Its subtle but now its like were going instead of its up in the air. Is seeing THE HOBBIT such a bad thing? It'll be like CLOCKWORK ORANGE with 3d clamps on my eyes....Turn it off!!! PLEASE!!! TURN IT OFF!!!A few days later...HEY GENE, HOW ABOUT THAT D&D GAME? BAAAARRRRFFFF!!!!!!
Ed Greenwood walks up out of the blue... WELL... WELL... WELL...
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Post by geneweigel on Jan 2, 2013 12:49:06 GMT -5
Thank the Demigods of Cinema! My trip to see THE HOBBIT was assassinated by my friend's wife's guilt trip to take her nephews to see it. I think that this was the first time that I ever bragged about not seeing a film. The worst part about this whole fiasco is that there is a bigger fundamental shift in who saw it. I've got morons in my family lining up around the block who saw it who wouldn't touch RETURN OF THE KING's premiere with a ten foot pole: "YEAH, I READ IT IN HIGH SCHOOL FOR ENGLISH! I FORGOT, WHAT HAPPENS IN THE NEXT HOBBIT BOOK? I'M ASKING YOU CAUSE YOU KNOW ALL THAT STUFF!" I think Bilbo dies in that one... <<<Barf!>>> I've got a feeling that I'm going to get dragged in to see this in the next few weeks with runoff relatives though... I was getting queasy hearing them talk about enjoying scenes that apparently exist only in this film..
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Post by Scott on Jan 2, 2013 22:04:24 GMT -5
I did go see it. There was a lot to complain about, but I liked it. The pace was brutally slow sometimes. The movie has an identity crisis. Some of it is very close to the Hobbit book: singing dwarves tossing dishes around Bilbo's hobbit hole; Stupid trolls names Tom, Bert, and Bill, etc. but the next scene will be something added from the LotR appendices, or something Jackson made up, and it's got a completely different tone, closer to the LotR. The Azog element Jackson added is just plain bad!
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Post by geneweigel on Jan 3, 2013 9:28:04 GMT -5
Its gotten to the point where the comments regarding THE HOBBIT film are so bad that things are boggling my mind. So far, two fantasy "laymen" asked me if there were bugbears in THE HOBBIT book regarding this film. I don't know whats that about. I hate being the one to explain to people what a hobbit is all over again so Im actually not as excited as I was the last time and I'm playing dumb. I'm starting to get that feeling that these films have had an opposite effect. Instead of bringing class to mainstream fantasy its brought mainstream fantasy more credence. Like GAME OF THRONES for example, I've got people "downloading" the plots from the books all over again except this time its from less literate voices and all for a stinker series that I couldn't stand the first time around!
I'm kind of praying that Schwarzenegger can restore my interest in fantasy film by making if not a solid adaptation of a real story then a just-as-sleazy-Conan all over again but memories of CONAN THE DESTROYER and even dimmer memories of RED SONJA are shooting that idea down fast. Lets not forget all the media adaptations of Howard in the last 20 or so years! (Conan TV show, Conan cartoon series, Kull the Destroyer's crappy film, Conan's last neo-fantasy film outing, Solomon Kane's overbaked character film, etc.).
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Post by Scott on Jan 3, 2013 11:06:46 GMT -5
Yeah, nobody's really got Howard right.
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Post by geneweigel on Jan 5, 2013 19:51:55 GMT -5
Alright, so going with the notion that this is so far from the book it doesn't seem half bad. Many goods:
The 3D was pretty cool it seemed like it was going on right in front.
Wasn't any Scottish dwarves which was a big plus but I've heard they've got some ultra-Scotsman comedian for the last one but this has had enough dwarves with personality that its a good funny Gimli apology
The humanoids looked somewhat better from LOTR but I don't know where these bugbear remarks that I heard were coming from. The Great Goblin?
What some people have not read just astounds me sometimes.
The trolls seemed mixed up almost like it was an audio animatronic sequence on a Disney ride. As for the troll looks. My research on THE HOBBIT points to these being larger and more scaly so I was disappointed in that regard.
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Post by geneweigel on Jan 6, 2013 11:09:54 GMT -5
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Post by GRWelsh on Jan 6, 2013 12:29:27 GMT -5
Must've been a last minute switch, probably because the name 'Azog' sounds more impressive than 'Bolg' and also to give Thorin and Co. an 'old enemy' and an extra plot line for the movie.
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Post by geneweigel on Jan 6, 2013 23:31:12 GMT -5
Well THE HOBBIT wasn't "bad" bad overall.
I watched a movie (a horror) the other night and my wife, who most often concurs with my reviews in films, disproportionately reviewed the film in a negative light that I found engaging throughout. It was a foreign film and the take on how low humanity can sink was taken by her to represent the filmmakers. What I found to be a profound statement on complex human nature instead she took directly offensive to women. It was a physical threat of raping a female zombie by crude and monstrous people. She actually dubbed it as shitty and dumb movie once that scene was over.
That just goes to show what one person considers genius another considers crap even if they are usually on the same page.
I think there is a lot to consider with THE HOBBIT ahead of the book. It's for big dumb bucks and its big dumb bucks "book flavor".
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Post by GRWelsh on Jan 9, 2013 20:47:59 GMT -5
I finally saw THE HOBBIT, and right now I'm too tired to complain or I just don't feel like it. Maybe I saw enough negative or at least guarded reviews that it prepared me, and so I (metaphorically) put on my IT'S ALL GOOD t-shirt before going in. I enjoyed it for what it was: a compromise of questionable vision with a money-making machine.
Fran Walsh: I want to have the Elvenking riding a white stag! Money-Making Machine: I think I want three movies instead of two. Peter Jackson: No problem! I have this old trick of adding in completely new scenes with goblin warg-riders and fights that never happened... We can pad this thing out, no problem. Fran Walsh: Yeah, we're going to 'improve' the Tolkien story. Peter Jackson: 'Fix it' -- you know. Money-Making Machine: I don't care what you do, just make it into three movies. We're going to be richer than Thror!
Ugh.
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Post by Scott on Jan 9, 2013 21:26:17 GMT -5
It might be the first time I'd be looking forward to a 'special edition' DVD that was actually shorter than the theatrical release.
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Post by geneweigel on Jan 9, 2013 23:05:23 GMT -5
I couldn't imagine seeing it with real fans.... it would have been like consoling the bereaved in a funeral parlor! I honestly don't understand the New Zealand outlook it seems light years better than the USA/UK pc crap but its not enough sometimes. I think I having the notion that there will be a leap in technology that will make a pure adaptation of things to film someday considering they just remade Spiderman 10 years later. Even though in that case it was for the worse.
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Post by geneweigel on Jan 10, 2013 10:36:02 GMT -5
Honestly the girls ages 7 and 11 were more interested in the bathroom and the snack bar. The boy wasn't old enough (2) but he might by the last one DESOLATION OF SMAUG comes out in December 2014. My wife keeps saying that the boy is inheriting all my D&D and toy junk so he'll be all set for a lifetime of disappoinment... I think this is aimed at kids anyway. The book was aimed at 1930's kids and this film series is aimed at that but including today's "OH SNAP!" types. I'm surprised they didn't fold in and have Will Smith play Bilbo! Seriously I feel like I'm being too harsh on shit. With, for example, STAR WARS, I feel like I went through a bitter divorce.( Last year or the year before my cousin Bill was trying to get me revved up for THE PHANTOM MENACE 3D and I was like "ARE YOU FOR FUCKING REAL?" ) I know the whole PATHFINDER shit mentality is such an annoying and unremovable association for D&D like STAR WARS' problems but who has the energy for STAR WARS? I don't see any value in it. It has no redeemability that things like D&D and the work of Tolkien do. At least for me they do and I think that separates me from the glib D&D for itself people. The minute that you feel sorry for STAR WARS there is a show on CARTOON NETWORK with karate-leaping creature cantina "Hammerheads" popping around and talking normally that makes you want to throw a brick at the screen. I hope the new Disney Star Wars can bring me back but driving down "STAR WARS as an rpg" boulevard has been a shitty road. How to you get rid of the flipping?
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Post by GRWelsh on Jan 10, 2013 11:34:20 GMT -5
I was going to write a longer rant about THE HOBBIT, but what's the point -- on this forum, it would just be preaching to a choir that has already ranted about it and beat me to it.
No one can take away my Ballantine Tolkien paperbacks printed in 1970's... the ones I still have and treasure... that's all that really matters!
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