Movies, Movies
The nice thing about finishing a book is that I finally treat myself to the movies I’ve been wanting to watch. So, yay! Avengers was much better than I thought it would be. I still don’t get why ***SPOILER PLOT POINT SPOILER*** Loki let himself be captured … was it just in the hope that the Hulk would take out the other heroes, really? ***END SPOILER PLOT POINT*** But, whatever. They did a good job making certain that each character had his/her moment, and played to their strengths (though it still makes me laugh hysterically every time I see Captain America with a machine gun. I know he’s the ultimate soldier, but there’s something about spandex and automatic weapons that just doesn’t compute for me.)
But the movie I’m really, really looking forward to, even more than the final Batman movie (and this is really saying something):
If the video doesn’t embed, it’s the Prometheus trailer.
Re-Watched
I also re-watched Dog Soldiers, which is a werewolf movie that I don’t see mentioned very often, but that I love a little more every time I see it. Dog Soldiers is also why I made it through my first viewing of The Descent — not because The Descent was bad, but because the parts where the ladies were squeezing through tiny holes in the cave made me so, so claustrophobic and anxious that I could barely watch it. Those scenes were far, far more terrifying than the cave mutants. Anyway, they have the same director/writer (Neil Marshall) and that’s almost like trusting an author — they got you through one movie without disappointing you, so you have hope that they’ll do the same to the next. I haven’t seen Centurion or Doomsday yet, though (though Centurion is on Netflix streaming, but I don’t usually love movies about ancient Rome/Romans (I kinda didn’t like Gladiator at all, for example, though that might also have been because of Russell Crowe … (though perhaps unsurprisingly, I enjoyed the super-cheesy Spartacus TV show)). And Doomsday looks right up my alley, but it isn’t streaming, and my current DVD queue is filled with movies to show the girl. Sigh. Maybe I will sneak it in, anyway.)
And because I want to test this video division class on my blog again, here’s the trailer for Dog Soldiers.
OMG, Worst Trailer Ever.
May 22, 2012 @ 2:20 pm
great movice 🙂
May 22, 2012 @ 5:31 pm
I heart Joss Whedon almost too much for it to be legal, so of course I was inclined to think positive things about The Avengers before I even saw it, but still…I think it one of the better superhero adaptations/movies I’ve seen and I also think it works as a story apart from the superhero thing. What I mean by that is, unlike with movies like Armageddon which also played in that arena of bringing together a disparate group of people to defeat the big bad, I actually believed each character in the group was remaining true to their individual natures and personalities as they went through the group formation steps (forming, storming, norming, performing) and not just demonstrating random personality traits that were thrown into the characters purely to move the story in one direction or another to serve the writer’s needs at that moment. That made it easier for me to just get in the car and enjoy the ride.
Since I was too enthralled to analyze things like interior logic while watching, I’m not certain about the Loki thing. Maybe he was relying on the trickster god trait of causing chaos and doing the unexpected thing as being enough of an explanation to justify Loki’s thought process? I’ll have to *think* a little more the next time I see it…
As respects Dog Soldiers and The Descent: Yes! Both are so damned good, it’s a shame they aren’t better known to the wider public. And it’s a shame that I feel obliged *not* to talk about the end to The Descent too definitively so as not to ruin it for those who haven’t watched it and thus lose an opportunity for myself to swoon and rave. I’ll just say that bits and pieces from the entire movie have stuck with me years after seeing it and that I really appreciate how the ending so elegantly stays true to the story that inspired it yet molds the concept to its own purposes in a way that manages to increase the impact.
Finally, the trailer for Prometheus sent so many shivers up and down my spine when I saw it before The Avengers that I’m afraid to watch it again. I have a feeling I’ll be going to see the movie the week-end it debuts, even though I’m certain I’ll also be feeling a bit like I’m about to walk off a cliff.
May 23, 2012 @ 4:21 am
I don’t love Joss Whedon as much as I used to, so I approached the movie with some trepidation (especially after those horrible trailers.) I mean, I do think that he’s an excellent storyteller and I love that he focuses on character. I just don’t always trust that he won’t pull another Wash.
For the Loki thing, I totally get the trickster god part — but as I mentioned below, my WTF feeling stems from all of that tricking on his part is done because he believes the Avengers were a threat, and that I just didn’t really buy. Thor as a threat, maybe. But Thor wasn’t even there yet when Loki was caught.
Anyway, not a big deal, and it led to a great action sequence. I think I just had a different mental image of Loki than was used to plot, so it led to that grating, Whuh, really? feeling.
May 23, 2012 @ 2:24 pm
Pulling another Wash: this is my main fear with everything Whedon related (see Dr Horrible)
And yet…he’s such a great writer!!!
May 23, 2012 @ 3:02 pm
Oh, I didn’t mind what happened in Doctor Horrible (avoiding spoilers) because it contributed to the plot/development of Horrible. It was the perfect wonderful awful twist, even as much as my romantic heart disliked it, there was really no other way to go and remain true to the story.
But Wash just served no purpose. There was the great line when the captain asks Zoe whether she’ll fly, and her response is great, but other than that …? It was just shock value. It was essentially a meaningless death –however realistic that might be– and that makes me kind of wary of his other work now. Meaningless death happens all time in life. So I don’t need it in my fiction, especially when it happens to characters that we’ve come to care about.
May 31, 2012 @ 1:27 pm
Today I came across the theory that Loki allowing himself to be captured is a “Xanatos Gambit”: http://maskofreason.wordpress.com/2012/05/23/very-good-writing-why-loki-won-in-the-avengers/.
So – another theory to contemplate when I see it again…
May 23, 2012 @ 4:05 am
Loki getting captured was about undermining the Avengers as a team and a threat before going ahead with his main objective. With Hawkeye and the doc taking care of preparing Tesseract, Loki took the opportunity to mess with the heroes – he mentioned the Hulk to Black Widow on purpose to make the others that the Hulk was a threat to THEM so that they would remove him as a threat to HIM.
He IS a trickster god, after all – messing with people is kind of his forte.
May 23, 2012 @ 4:15 am
No, I got all of that. I was just surprised that was actually the reason he was there, because it’s an admission that they were a threat.
May 23, 2012 @ 11:56 am
I love Dog Soldiers! (This from someone who hates horror movies.) I’m an American going to grad school in Edinburgh, and a close friend there is a film buff. We watch every Scottish movie she can get her hands on, and Dog Soldiers was absolutely hilarious.
May 23, 2012 @ 4:11 pm
It’s my favorite kind of movie — mixing the scary with the bits of funny. Even if nothing is a surprise in it, it’s just a good time all the way through.
May 24, 2012 @ 3:22 am
Centurion is the movie with Michael Fassbender, right? I liked it (and not just because of Fassbender). It’s not so much about Rome as it is about a bunch of guys fighting for their lives behind enemy lines, so the time period is just the setting (same scrip but different setting, would have worked). Now I’m off to watch Dog Soldiers and Doomsday, I didn’t know it was the same director, I enjoyed The Descent but I have crappy movie taste -and by crappy I mean that I like pretty much everything- so it’s not surprising that I liked it, claustrophobic scenes and all.
One movie I watched recently that I really, really loved, was Flipped (directed by Rob Reiner). It’s based on a book by Wendelin Van Draanen and it tells the story of two kids: Julie and Bryce. Love at first sight for her, hate at first sight for him. The movie it’s called Flipped because you get to see each situation from both POVs. It was adorable, the kids were awesome and I must get the book.
And finally, I’m also looking forward to Prometheus. My most anticipated movie of the year. I’m such a fan of the franchise, and this one looks fantastic. I hope it’s as good as the original, although I even liked Alien vs. Predator 1 AND 2 (I wasn’t kidding when I said that I liked everything), so I think I’m going to like this one regardless.
Love the new site BTW!