tomahawk said:
The Interview
Before all the bull ****, I was excited to see this as I typically enjoy Rogen/Franco movies, despite the excessive weed jokes. We got it through Xbox video and the wife and I sat down to watch it. I enjoyed it for what it was, a really stupid comedy. Did they go a little far, of course. They rehashed a few things from Pineapple Express, and you definitely lose some of the humor not being in a crowded theater.
I watched it last night and it was "okay I guess". The real saving grace was the fact that they did take it so far. It was all really obvious and I can't stand telegraphed humour though. At least they did actually follow through and go too far so it was kind of okay because of it.
gavin said:
Gone Girl
I missed this at the cinema, but got around to watching it a couple of days ago. I was close to not bothering since I really liked the book and it's rare that a film adaptation ever lives up to that, but this was a really decent version, probably because the original author wrote the screenplay. You don't get into the characters anywhere near as much - it's much more focused on the basic events of the story - but it stuck with the overall atmosphere and intensity of the book really well.
I've not read the original book and knew nothing about it, so it was all fresh to me. I found it very
very similar to Zodiac and The Social Network in that it was a bit pedestrian. There wasn't anything wrong with it, everything was perfectly well done, but it never excelled. It just told the tale and finished without ever really making much of an effort. I guess it's bad to be negative about a film because it's "perfectly fine", but it just meant it was underwhelming and forgettable.
tomahawk said:
The Imitation Game
Much better than I anticipated, and Cumberbatch was fantastic. This is going to come off sounding bad, as I've tried phrasing it several different ways which all sound worse, but I am glad they didn't focus the entirety of the movie on him being gay, rather just placed the necessary amount on it. It was, I think, respectful in the way they did it as they didn't belittle him by claiming the movie was made simply because he was gay, but rather focused on his accomplishments, and his historical significance to the war. Very good film and worth a watch. Cumberbatch will definitely clean up come awards time.
I actually really enjoyed it, which was a relief. I did history of computing at uni and was worried that it might be a little too light on historical accuracy. It wasn't perfect, but it captured the work they did pretty well and the made up bits gave Cummerbund the chance excel in being autistic
So the fantasy was forgiveable, but not so sure about how special they portrayed Turing.
peep said:
Into the woods
At first it was a little slow and too much use of the same musical theme but as the film progressed I really got into it and there were some fantastic scenes. I liked the set designs and how it was like a stage set but with a feature like budget.
And finally (for the moment :lol: ) I'm not sure about Into the woods. I liked it to start with because it's the first time I've seen James Corden in something and haven't wanted to punch him. So it endeared me to it.
I thought Meryl was a little too obviously over the top in an attempt to get the over-the-top-so-it-must-be-good award. Worse though, her character was a bit unclear. I think that's because the mixing of the tales wasn't clear and it ended up a bit of a mess, not really knowing what path it should take - so it just made **** up because hell, it's a fairy tale!
By the end of the "quest" I thought it had run out of steam though and needed to wrap up - the entire post quest stuff was too much and went on too long and anti-climatically.
I agree with you Peep about the stage set at times. You'll watch and think "this is really a cleverly advanced stage show" and it works. Then other times (like the props from the bean stalk) it felt cardboard and crap. Like the story, the concept of making a filmed stage show never settled down and ended up either quite clever or a bit ****. Musical score was too samey, but it kind of worked - again, it never worked out whether using the same stuff was clever or not, so it would suddenly break into something different and then realise that it was breaking the flow it had set up and go back again.
So yeah, it was all a bit of a mess, but not completely unwatchable.
Big Hero 6 is next on my list, hopefully this weekend
Oh, I also made MMF sit through
Watership Down because I'm a ****. He loved the cute rabbits and their exciting and rabbitty lives.... Until 20 minutes in one of the cute rabbits (with a cute little rabbitty name) gets maliciously eaten by a hawk. We never even made it to "Bright Eyes" which would have finished him off :lol: Watership down, screwing up kids for 35 years
