Last Film You Watched

[carlos21]

I'm liking this lady at the moment...she's in the Hunger Games films

She is allright like.

 

[dholliday]

What's your weekend plans mate.

I work at the weekends...fixing computer problems.

What you up to this weekend, our kid?

 

[carlos21]

I work at the weekends...fixing computer problems.

What you up to this weekend, our kid?

Nothing much mate.

 

[dholliday]

Nothing much mate.

I'll come in your thread, mate

 

[carlos21]

I'll come in your thread, mate

Nice one dude.

 

[Camkela]

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1172570/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1

 

[flo]

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1172570/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1

Is it any good?

 

[Philw]

For dystopic sci-fi of the 00's, we'll be talking about Children of Men long after culture has dismissed Hunger Games. Which one was typical Hollywood and which was one was atypical?

Not really a fair comparison as HG is for teens. Is CoM originally a book aswell? Because it's not really fair to critique HG that way as it's 'just' an adaptation. Really it would be better to compare an original film aimed at adults.

I work at the weekends...fixing computer problems.

What you up to this weekend, our kid?

I assume you live in Liverpool??

 

[McBain]

That's a bit of an extreme interpretation, Mac lol

The sentence again:

There's been a much larger focus on delivering the same formula time & again, it's obviously nothing new. But the focus has increased, filtering out more innovative releases, or making potentially-innovative releases more mundane (safe, formulaic). This increased focus means less risks, less risks mean less creative output.

Of course it's all opinion. But then again it's a well-known situation in the industry that Hollywood is taking much less risks with its products than it used to, an obvious example of this are the incessant franchises, remakes, reboots, sequels and spin-offs...repeating the same tired tropes. As ever, it's all about the money. If you google hollywood taking less risks then you'll find hundreds of articles & discussions on this very thing.

Which is a shame as Hollywood used to also be about the art, about adding to our culture. This aspect is getting swamped by the increased focus on the mainstream formula.

I love the debate, I just think your basing it on old arguments, and don't actually see the innovation. Your saying Hollywood is taking much less risks. Not True.

Avatar was reported to have cost around $400 million just to make, without Marketing. It was an original story. It was supposed to be a massive bomb at the time. So was Titanic if you remember. Cameron basically invented a new Technique. He developed his own Cameras. He made exactly the Film he wanted to make. He personally made over 350 million dollars.

John Carter? Cost the same amount of money to produce and made $284 million worldwide. It had to make at least $600m to break even.

Avatar is an original property. One is century old book which inspired the likes of Star Wars, Buck Rogers, Flash Gordon etc. And James Cameron had this to say on the launch of Avatar

"With Avatar, I thought, Forget all these chick flicks and do a classic guys’ adventure movie, something in the Edgar Rice Burroughs mold, like John Carter of Mars – a soldier goes to Mars."

Steven Speilberg

I think that the Internet is going to effect the most profound change on the entertainment industries combined. And we're all gonna be tuning into the most popular Internet show in the world, which will be coming from some place in Des Moines. We're all gonna lose our jobs. We're all gonna be on the Internet trying to find an audience.

The older I get, the more I look at movies as a moving miracle. Audiences are harder to please if you're just giving them special effects, but they're easy to please if it's a good story. The audience is also the toughest critic - a good story that exists in your world may not be the first choice for an audience. So I just do the best I can.

Times have changed. It's like when the first 747 landed at Los Angeles international airport: everybody thought flying through the sky was the most greatest marvel they had ever seen - floating through the air, seemingly in slow motion. Today we never even look at 747s. They're a dime a dozen and it's that way with the blockbuster. If there was one blockbuster every three years, it meant a lot more than when you have a blockbuster every three weeks. It's the job of each of these studios to market these movies as the must-see movie of the year, so they go after blockbuster status by creating a grand illusion. Sometimes they've got a real engine behind that grand illusion, meaning the movie is damned good and the audience will say they got their money's worth. Other times, the audience comes on the promise of seeing something they've never ever seen before and it becomes just another sci-fi action yarn and they feel disappointed.

James Cameron

...you can read all the books about filmmaking, all the articles in American Cinematographer and that sort of thing, but you have to really see how it works on a day-to-day basis, and how to pace your energy so that you can survive the film, which was a lesson that took me a long time to learn.

With digital 3D projection, we will be entering a new age of cinema. Audiences will be seeing something which was never technically possible before the age of digital cinema - a stunning visual experience which 'turbocharges' the viewing of the biggest, must-see movies. The biggest action, visual effects and fantasy movies will soon be shot in 3D. And all-CG animated films can easily be converted to 3D, without additional cost if it is done as they are made. Soon audiences will associate 3D with the highest level of visual content in the market, and seek out that premium experience

I kind of turned my back on the Terminator world when there was early talk about a third film. I'd evolved beyond it. I don't regret that, but I have to live with the consequence, which is that I keep seeing it resurrected. I'm not involved in Terminator Salvation. I've never read the script. I'm sure I'll be paying 10 bucks to see it like everybody else.

George Lucas

Making a film is like putting out a fire with sieve. There are so many elements, and it gets so complicated.

With film, if you get a million people to see your movie on the first weekend, you've made about $5 million. That basically will not end up on the top-10 chart. You have to get 10 million people on the first weekend. And if you don't do it in two days, you're basically out of the theaters and into the DVD market. There's just an ecology there. If you're a mouse, don't expect to kill a lion, because it ain't gonna happen. If you want to have that kind of power, it's better to be a lion, because the mice are fine - you can have a life and everything - but the lions are the ones out there prowling and scaring the hell out of everybody.

Yeah, I have a few dollars, but when you're getting up to the point where the average movie costs $80 million, anything under $20 million is pretty cheap. Anything under $10 million is almost impossible. And anything under $5 million is Roger Corman

 

[dholliday]

We went through Hunger Games 3 last night...had some really good moments but it was mostly just exposition and manufactured drama (the sister going back for her cat was weak). 6/10, looks like it's setting up a return to the breathless action of part 2, hopefully.

Lots of parallels with todays' world, of course: the capital in this case mirroring our western world. And the rebels...well, best leave that one unsaid.

Not really a fair comparison as HG is for teens. Is CoM originally a book aswell? Because it's not really fair to critique HG that way as it's 'just' an adaptation. Really it would be better to compare an original film aimed at adults.

Hiya Phil...I mentioned the rebooted Planet of the Apes and Superman films before and linked hundreds of discussions, it's not just Hunger Games, it's 15 years of Hollywood creative stagnation.

But regarding Hunger Games, parts 2 & 3 showed what can be done when the tired cliches are dropped (saving the cat excepted).

I assume you live in Liverpool??

I'm in Berlin, which is apparently in vogue now, which is crap for me as we're looking for a bigger flat and the rents have skyrocketed in comparison to a few years ago. Literally doubled, ffs.

I love the debate, I just think your basing it on old arguments, and don't actually see the innovation. Your saying Hollywood is taking much less risks. Not True.

Avatar was reported to have cost around $400 million just to make, without Marketing. It was an original story. It was supposed to be a massive bomb at the time. So was Titanic if you remember. Cameron basically invented a new Technique. He developed his own Cameras. He made exactly the Film he wanted to make. He personally made over 350 million dollars.

John Carter? Cost the same amount of money to produce and made $284 million worldwide. It had to make at least $600m to break even.

Avatar is an original property. One is century old book which inspired the likes of Star Wars, Buck Rogers, Flash Gordon etc. And James Cameron had this to say on the launch of Avatar

"With Avatar, I thought, Forget all these chick flicks and do a classic guys’ adventure movie, something in the Edgar Rice Burroughs mold, like John Carter of Mars – a soldier goes to Mars."

Ay up, Mac. You're not wrong in any of this, but I was talking about characterisation and plot development. Where the story came from and how it was made is another discussion.

John Carter and Avatar had many of the same tired tropes we've seen countless times in the last 15 years. Sure, we've seen them before then but they weren't so homogeneous as they are now.

 

[coollino]

Crimson Peak - loved it, more than expected.

 

[quasi modo]

Creed, but I just fast forwarded it all the way to the fight at Goodison.

 

[tonyhorne]

Watched this last night

Sort of a cross between Oceans 11 and the Fit Birds thread. Plenty of twists and turns to keep the viewer entertained but, ultimately, not as good and clever as it seems to think it is. Enjoyable enough if a little over glamorous...........

 

[USABlue]

 

[ijjysmith]

I feel scared to watch this.

Please say it looks amazing.