Posted on 10/11/2015 1:52:56 PM PDT by EveningStar
There's much to sadly shake your head at in Pan, a sort of Peter Pan Begins that manages the unlikely feat of making battles between flying pirate ships a crushing bore. Most miserably, there's the great heap of action set pieces that are easier to wait out than to track with an instrument so primitive as the human eye—perhaps the singularity is nearing, and director Joe Wright's computers are whipping these scenes up exclusively for the enjoyment of advanced artificial intelligences ...
But here's perhaps the most egregious betrayal of audience intelligence in this latest go at monetizing those aspects of J.M. Barrie's Neverland that have fallen into the public domain. An opening narration attempts to justify the choice to concoct an origin for Pan, that spirit of whimsy and play that certainly doesn't need backstory. "Sometimes to truly understand how things end, we must first know how they began," the movie insists—as if this is all somehow a thoughtful attempt to get at the root truths of Peter Pan, to explore the sources of our common myths ...
(Excerpt) Read more at ocweekly.com ...
I remember being a little kid and the Mary Martin version of Peter Pan was on TV. At one point, she faces the camera and begs everyone to clap if they believe in fairies, so Tinkerbell won’t die.
Not one of us kids moved a muscle.
My thoughts exactly after seeing the Martian.
My bud 2 blocks away here in L.A. worked on it for 4 months. Everyone in the crew knew it was a rip off of Interstellar and that was better because Damon played an insane douchebag and died, which was fantastic.
Book is better than the movie. However, both enjoyable. Wouldn’t have seen the movie (because of Matt Damon) except for how much I liked the book.
We finally watched American Sniper and neither were impressed. While it was well done, we thought it was over-rated. Lone Survivor was a much better film. Still, my heart goes out to Chris Kyle's family. What a sad way to die when you're helping a fellow Vet at a gun range. Then again, he was doing what he loved.
My wife has unfortunately become a movie critic from my discussions. She recognizes poor acting, poor dialog, poor story-line, plot holes, and even sometimes poor direction which is difficult for most critics to evaluate.
She also sees poor editing, and like me, gets tired of the shaky camera that portend to show real life. Uh, does anyone ever move their head so quickly when talking to a real person? We watched a movie the other day where we had to turn if off because of the camera shaking about and almost made us sick.
Again, smaller non-action movies sometimes can be the best. Think "My Big Fat Greek Wedding" romantic comedy or a "Beautiful Mind" thoughtful drama. Yeah, I know, Russell Crowe is liberal. Sorry, I choose to ignore their politics, as I did in his movie "Cinderella Man", as I did in Sandra Bullock's film "The Blind Side".
Transformers suck as do many other lame CGI movies! Ghostrider was probably the worse in recent years. Can't believe that Peter Jackson had to continue with the Hobbit crap. Lord of the Rings trilogy was awesome, but this Hobbit stuff is the same ole with the same ole big epic battles. Pfft.
That said, Tom Cruise action movies usually work, whether Mission Impossible or sci-fi like "Oblivion" or "Edge of Tomorrow". He may be a flake, but he is also the most under-rated actor in Hollyweird and he chooses great scripts - think "Jerry Macquire". Like Bruce Willis, he is always watchable...plus he has the cojones to do most of his own stunts.
There are so many sci-fi novels, novelettes, and short stories that could fuel Hollywood for years to come. But no, they insist on remakes and sequels like Planet of the Who Gives a Crap About Apes or Superman is back AGAIN! or physically impossible Avengers complex CGI crap.
I think that if Arthur C. Clark's, "Childhoods End" were ever adapted to the big screen with a good director, it could be a box office smash. It is an original huge story about the future of mankind with a twist ending. Yes, it's about aliens landing on Earth, but it is nothing like you've seen or read. Another well done sci-fi movie was, "Knowing". It pulled you in from the start and the ending was thoughtful and hopeful for mankind's existence. Plus, it was a mystery, which I love.
From what I've seen of the promos, it looks like a re-hash of Mission to Mars. Much of it looks already done. Hope there's more to it since I love good sci-fi.
I was once told that Peter Pan was a wash basin in a house of ill repute. Apparently not in this movie.
Interesting that Depp can be really outstanding as in, "Edward Scissorhands", "Pirates of the Carribean", "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas", but then mediocre to awful in "Sweeny Todd", "Alice in Wonderland", and "Once Upon a Time in Mexico" (the supposedly sequel to "Desperado").
I give major kudos to Robert Rodriquez for writing, directing, producing, editing, and scoring "Once Upon...", but it didn't work for me - too convoluted. Guess after Desperado my expectations were too high. It's one of my favorite action films and Depp added nothing to "Once Upon...". Rodriquez should have centered more on Antonio Banderas and Salma Hayek and where they went from the ending rather than try to make an epic.
The other astronauts left Matt Damon to die on Mars.
I think later in the movie they are upset he did not....
It was actually pretty good. I saw the Swedish movies too, and read the books, enjoying both. Noomi Rapace was great.
Please, sharknado, giant snakes vs giant alligators, gigantor insects popping up in the most unlikely places? And then there is the weak acting, direction, and production values.
If I want to watch corny implausible sci-fi scenarios, I'll watch re-runs of old sci-fi movies.
So what did you think of "Knowing", "Oblivion", and "Edge of Tomorrow"? I thought they were excellent adaptations.
Okay that's different from Mission to Mars which is a rescue attempt for the first failed mission. The ending is the best part.
Still, the promos show Damon recording his efforts to produce food and water just as a stranded astronaut did in Mission to Mars. Again, a stranded astronaut on Mars. Been done.
My wife and I quite liked it.
YMMV.
Totally different story.
Am I the only one who thought Sandra Bullock’s “Gravity” was boring? Okay, the re-entry was fun, but her and Clooney floating around in space was a snoozefest, although well done special affects. They couldn’t have use an aircraft to simulate no gravity for that length of the movie. Apollo 13 actors did.
Hope so, since I love a well produced sci-fi movie.
Likewise been done long ago in Robinson Caruso on Mars.
Per Twitter, more than a few people walked out of the theater thinking “The Martian” was based on a true story.
*sigh*
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