Save the Movie!

Slate ^ | By Peter Suderman|Posted Friday, July 19, 2013, at 5:55 AM

[Perdogg]

If you’ve gone to the movies recently, you may have felt a strangely familiar feeling: You’ve seen this movie before. Not this exact movie, but some of these exact story beats: the hero dressed down by his mentor in the first 15 minutes (Star Trek Into Darkness, Battleship); the villain who gets caught on purpose (The Dark Knight, The Avengers, Skyfall, Star Trek Into Darkness); the moment of hopelessness and disarray a half-hour before the movie ends (Olympus Has Fallen, Oblivion, 21 Jump Street, Fast & Furious 6).

[rlmorel]

Hahahahahahah

[rlmorel]

I used to be an inveterate movie consumer, probably up until the mid-nineties, I would sometimes go to two movies a week.

Something happened. It seems like, in the last twenty years, we get Jurassic Park IV, Pirates of the Carribean X, Die Hard XVIII, and so on.

I see a movie once in a while that I like, but largely don’t go to movies anymore.

Sigh, I used to admire Pixar for their originality, but...even they have been producing slop for a few years. The nadir of my disappointment with them was with “Brave”. Just crap.

[llmc1]

I only watched about 10 minutes of that last night and it still gave me nightmares.

[rlmorel]

I wouldn't go see Avatar, even though I usually make it a point to see where the state of the art in computer animation lies. It was the overt politicization of the movie and the formulaic approach to the plot that turned me off.

When I saw it on rental, I saw I was right on the money. I had to laugh when I saw this, because it is so true:

[SilvieWaldorfMD]

Saw “RED 2” this morning. It was okay.

Strangely, the instrumental music played in some scenes was very, very similar to some of the scenes on “Skyfall”...

Oh and I love Malkovich and Mirren!

[Excellence]

My son practically dragged me to see Red. So I thought he’d want to see Red 2, but he wants to see Pacific Rim. Or Atlantic Rim. Whatever. I said, “It’s just another monster movie.” He said, “But it’s robots.”
I’m not surprised the music resembled Skyfall. Isn’t it a bit of a send up to all those spy movies?
I still want to see it.

[Some Fat Guy in L.A.]

So....why does anyone still go? Why pay 10 bucks for a ticket and 10 more for popcorn and a coke to see a bad movie? Stay home and watch old movies on Netflix instead.

[SC_Pete]

That’s hysterical—thanks for sharing. LOL Cameron is a simple-minded ideologue, who sells garbage to stupid people. On the other hand, his net worth indicates he’s much smarter than the people he’s selling to. :)

[Borges]

Cameron is a humongous talent. Avatar is probably his worst feature film but he hasn’t really made a bad film. The Terminator, Aliens, The Abyss, Terminator 2, True Lies and Titanic are all good.

[SC_Pete]

I agree he’s a great producer/director—it’s his worldview that’s simple-minded. Corporations are always the bad guys and capitalism is root of all evil. Then, Cameron makes millions selling stuff. He’s laughing all the way to the bank.