The Movie Thread

[Tripod]

In the sense of prequels or in terms of 3D?

Anyway, when it comes to 3D, I'm with Alkis. Given the choice, I'd watch a movie in 2D. It worked well enough with Avatar, been a disappointment since. I had some hope Prometheus would profit and the first scenes were pretty cool, but the sensation wore off quickly.

[mmike]

no doubt that alien series had better movies than prometheus, but this movie is PREQUEL and they made it after 4 initial movies. it is not that easy to make a prequel story that makes sense, and i believe that they have done a descent job.

speaking of 3d, prometheus is obviously designed to be a 3d movie, and let me say - well designed. some sceens are spectacular, models of ships and terrain on a planet also, everything is dynamic and fast... after avatar, this is my favourite 3d movie.

[manicx]

3D comes down to how well a movie is made to be 3D. Most animated movies are awesome in 3D. I was almost in tears when I watched How to Train Your Dragon. Tron Legacy 3D was also phenomenal. It was a dream coming true. Avatar was good because 90% of the movie was CGI. Most movies with lots of CGI are great for 3D. The Avengers is another great 3D movie. 3D is great. The amount of 3D used depends on the movie. Some are advertised as 3D but only have few scenes for 3D, the rest if the scenes have mild to non-existent 3D to a degree that the glasses will give you a almost 2Dish effect.

[Tripod]

no doubt that alien series had better movies than prometheus, but this movie is PREQUEL and they made it after 4 initial movies. it is not that easy to make a prequel story that makes sense, and i believe that they have done a descent job.

I try to never include spoilers in my posts, so I won't go into specifics. But all in all I'd say Prometheus wasn't all bad - but as a prequel to the Alien movies it really sucked. I'm hinting especially at the final scene, of course. Even if they now make sequels of this prequel, I'm not sure they can recover from that.

@Nikos and 3D: I dunno, I think Prometheus had a lot of the elements that worked well in Avatar and still I was underwhelmed. Maybe the novelty has worn off, for me at least.

[alkis21]

I have two suggestions for you today. Coincidentally, both are about a cabin in the woods. In fact, the first one is even called...

Film : The Cabin in the Woods
Watched : 27/08/12
Score : 10/10

Beware that this is NOT a film about everyone. There has to be something fundamentally wrong and sick with you for you to enjoy it. I cannot describe it in any way, watch it if you are a fan of gore but know that it is much, much more than that. I can't reveal anything else about it, and don't read anything about it either other than the short description in IMDB.

Film: Enter Nowhere
Watched: mid-August 2012
Score: 8/10

Three strangers are stranded at a mysterious cabin in the forest. They need to figure out why they are there. Extremely atmospheric no-budget movie that constantly manages to surprise you. Again, beware of spoilers.

[Tripod]

Cheers! Both sound very interesting, will have to check them out.

[r.cross]

I hate it that Prometheus had to be a prequel to Alien. I love the first two Aliens so much that I'm ultimately undecided whether or not to watch Prometheus. I think it's almost impossible for me to like it. Scott should have made just another 3D SciFi-Popcporn-Movie, without touching the old legend...

Recently I've been watching 3 films, all of them in local cinemas:

film:MIB-3
score:7/10
I liked the first part but found the second film quite boring. After hearing that the third part is of similar quality than the first I decided to give it a go - and yeah, I enjoyed it like the first one. Nothing special about it but very entertaining.

film:Dark Shadows
score:9/10
I mentioned it before, I simply love most of the Burton/Depp work. And this one might even be touching 'Ed Wood' which had been my favourite so far. Great Cast, great pictures and very, very funny. A true recomendation!

film:The Rum Diary
score:8/10
I've been persuaded to watch that by three friends, strangely I was the only one who really enjoyed it. Again I thought the cast was great, the story probably a little thin, but it's a great and atmospheric movie. We need more rum

[Tripod]

Film: Skyfall
Format: Cinema
Score: 6/10

Review: The Bond movies keep re-inventing themselves and Skyfall definitely belongs in the 21st century, few jokes, little over-the-top action, Bond has become entirely human. Javier Bardem makes for a great villain and the central trio - Craig, Bardem and Dame Judi Dench - all perform well. However, as always I have to criticise the glaring plot holes, please don't be like me and contemplate on the story afterwards, none of it makes any sense.

[Stainy]

Film: Looper
Format: misc.
Score: 9/10


Watched this today.. Brilliant movie..
Great idea, brilliantly executed as well..
It's essentially a time travel movie but you don't get caught up in the whole mechanics of time travel itself.
Tag line was : this decades Matrix!!!!

Yes

[Tripod]

Film: Cabin in the Woods
Score: 8/10

Review: Great recommendation by Alkis, thoroughly enjoyed this one. The title alone makes clear that this is a... deconstruction of the genre while still fully embracing it. It's a lot of fun, it's pretty clever, a must-see for old horror fans like myself.

Film: Looper
Score: 7/10

Review: The bizarre initial premise - since it's difficult to kill people in the future the mafia uses time travel to send people back to the past to have them killed there - thankfully fades away pretty quickly and a more interesting plot evolves. Not to its full potential, I dare say. But nonetheless, it's worth a recommendation. The story isn't predictable, the characters have a fair amount of depth, it doesn't rely on big action and explosions and offers a decent dystopian future.

Film: Hunger Games
Score: 2/10

Review: Another fine example of how not to turn a novel into a movie. Every scene in the book made it into the film - but it's all pointless, no emotional attachment to the characters whatsoever. The problem becomes obvious from the very start, the movie rushes through the exposition, the viewer learns nothing of life in District 12 or the central characters. Read the trilogy of books, I certainly enjoyed them, even though classified as young adult fiction. But don't bother with the movie.

[Steve1977]

Film: Apollo 18
Format: Sky Movies
Score: 7/10

I got a real kick out of this film, initially from a technical POV in that despite it being one of those 'footage found' films, it was a footage found film set on the moon and in the 70's no less and thus, the fact that it mimmicked the TV broadcasts from around this time and sustained interest and belief for the whole duration is to be commended. Reading other reviews on the net, it seemed they had a hard time with the main villains of the piece but it's the moon, there's not a lot up there!
A very inventive film.

[Steve1977]

Film: Captain America
Format: Sky Movies
Score: 6/10

I had high hopes for this one and it didn't disappointed from a story POV but from a film-making one it was sorely lacking for me. First of all, I loved the whole 'person doesn't stand up for themselves but has an unabashed innocence for the world and then finally gets their chance to have a go back' - perhaps not the catchiest synopsis but my brain's fried from all the xmas excess lol. This part reminded me of Superman where the main character is jabbed at and derided but he rises above it all. Also great work in making the head lead look so weedy. However, why oh why oh why didn't they film some of it for real?! With real sets?! The amount of obvious green screening with pasted on background was painful and really took me out of the film.
The story itself was very good but I couldnt see past this aspect...give me matte boxes and dodgy puppets any day of the week - they at least had some charm.

[Steve1977]

Film: X-Men
Format: Sky Movies
Score: 8/10

After Captain America, it was great watching this. Set during the civil rights movement of the 60's, this followed the origins of the x-men and was a delight to watch. Matthew Vaughan did a terrific job in juggling all the cast and it felt like a proper solid adult movie. Loved how Magneto started as a James Bond esque character, slowly getting revenge on the people who wronged him as a child and terrific to have Professor X be a womanising playboy hehe.
Superb.