Movie Diary
a) Avatar
The years of mystery, and the last few months of deflating expectations, had me not really expecting much from Avatar, or even expecting to see it. But my dad, lifelong sci-fi nut he is, was pretty excited about it and took me and my brother to see it, and I have to say, it was perfectly good. The plot and dialogue weren't quite as rudimentary as some of the reviews led me to believe, and the special effects were nice but nothing jaw-dropping (some cool jungle beasts, but if only Cameron had half of, say, Guillermo Del Toro's flair for creature design). This was both my first IMAX experience w/ a commercial wide release movie (had only ever been to the one at the Maryland Science Center before this), and my first 3-D movie since I was a kid, and neither aspect really enriched my experience that much, although maybe I just hate wearing those dumb glasses.
b) Public Enemies
My main reason for being excited to see this was that my brother Zac was an extra in it, back when he was living in Wisconsin and they shot parts of it out there (he's in the background in the courtroom scene, about an hour in). I think I need to see it again to appreciate it as a movie, though, it seemed pretty good but I might've been too sleep-deprived to give it my full attention that day. Depp ruled as always, Bale seemed a little underused.
c) Star Trek
I was skeptical, if not downright resentful, of this movie from the jump. To me, the greatest strength of Star Trek, as a franchise, is that it can go in so many directions and generate so many new characters that you never have go back and recycle or recast characters -- there's only one Kirk, one Picard, we don't need a new one every 10 years like Batman or James Bond. And I only grew more stubborn in my dislike of the idea once this thing got universal praise.
d) He's Just Not That Into You
This movie taking place in Baltimore was by far the most entertaining thing about it; 90% of the time you'd just assume the characters were in San Francisco or something, and then out of nowhere they'd do some exterior shot of a rowhouse that felt completely incongruous with the rest of the movie. Lotta good-looking broads in this movie (plus Jennifer Aniston), but as a rom com it was kinda weak, tried to stuff too many characters and stories into it but no one of them really could've carried a movie on its own.
e) Last Chance Harvey
On Thanksgiving weekend, my brother-in-law and I sat around watching movies for hours, and at one point we exhausted the options on the OnDemand menu to such a degree that somehow we arrived at this as the best option we had left. We mostly watched the whole thing speculating on exactly what the title meant, and anytime any thing happened would yell at the TV "that was your last chance at love, Harvey" or "that was your last chance to catch that plane, Harvey."
f) Yes Man
I thought this was gonna be some Liar Liar retread bullshit, but I was pleasantly surprised both that this movie had its own nice little energy and some good jokes, and found a way to make the premise work without a goofy supernatural element. Jim Carrey, for all his faults, is still too talented and too committed to balls out comedy to let even his weaker movies be as worthless as a generic Adam Sandler or Ben Stiller vehicle or whatever. The completely unacknowledged 18-year age gap between the 2 leads was a little weird even by Hollywood standards, though.
g) Good Dick
Kind of a weird movie that started with a strong enough premise but I didn't really like where they took it, the kind of movie I'd only watch on cable up at 3am when I can't sleep. Also hated that it ended with the same "whispered dialogue you can't hear" move as Lost In Translation.
h) The Women
You wanna know how bad Meg Ryan's plastic surgery has gotten? The first hour or so that my wife had this on, I thought it was Michelle Pfeiffer.
i) Surf's Up
On a technical level I'm fascinated by how digitally animated movies have gotten closer and closer to simulating a real three dimensional world shot with a camera, that can go in and out of focus or change perspectives or get water on the lens. And to that effect, the mockumentary concept of this movie gives it a lot of opportunities to show off stuff like that, and it's pretty impressive. As for the actual entertainment value and overall craftmanship, it was still pretty sub-Pixar.
The years of mystery, and the last few months of deflating expectations, had me not really expecting much from Avatar, or even expecting to see it. But my dad, lifelong sci-fi nut he is, was pretty excited about it and took me and my brother to see it, and I have to say, it was perfectly good. The plot and dialogue weren't quite as rudimentary as some of the reviews led me to believe, and the special effects were nice but nothing jaw-dropping (some cool jungle beasts, but if only Cameron had half of, say, Guillermo Del Toro's flair for creature design). This was both my first IMAX experience w/ a commercial wide release movie (had only ever been to the one at the Maryland Science Center before this), and my first 3-D movie since I was a kid, and neither aspect really enriched my experience that much, although maybe I just hate wearing those dumb glasses.
b) Public Enemies
My main reason for being excited to see this was that my brother Zac was an extra in it, back when he was living in Wisconsin and they shot parts of it out there (he's in the background in the courtroom scene, about an hour in). I think I need to see it again to appreciate it as a movie, though, it seemed pretty good but I might've been too sleep-deprived to give it my full attention that day. Depp ruled as always, Bale seemed a little underused.
c) Star Trek
I was skeptical, if not downright resentful, of this movie from the jump. To me, the greatest strength of Star Trek, as a franchise, is that it can go in so many directions and generate so many new characters that you never have go back and recycle or recast characters -- there's only one Kirk, one Picard, we don't need a new one every 10 years like Batman or James Bond. And I only grew more stubborn in my dislike of the idea once this thing got universal praise.
d) He's Just Not That Into You
This movie taking place in Baltimore was by far the most entertaining thing about it; 90% of the time you'd just assume the characters were in San Francisco or something, and then out of nowhere they'd do some exterior shot of a rowhouse that felt completely incongruous with the rest of the movie. Lotta good-looking broads in this movie (plus Jennifer Aniston), but as a rom com it was kinda weak, tried to stuff too many characters and stories into it but no one of them really could've carried a movie on its own.
e) Last Chance Harvey
On Thanksgiving weekend, my brother-in-law and I sat around watching movies for hours, and at one point we exhausted the options on the OnDemand menu to such a degree that somehow we arrived at this as the best option we had left. We mostly watched the whole thing speculating on exactly what the title meant, and anytime any thing happened would yell at the TV "that was your last chance at love, Harvey" or "that was your last chance to catch that plane, Harvey."
f) Yes Man
I thought this was gonna be some Liar Liar retread bullshit, but I was pleasantly surprised both that this movie had its own nice little energy and some good jokes, and found a way to make the premise work without a goofy supernatural element. Jim Carrey, for all his faults, is still too talented and too committed to balls out comedy to let even his weaker movies be as worthless as a generic Adam Sandler or Ben Stiller vehicle or whatever. The completely unacknowledged 18-year age gap between the 2 leads was a little weird even by Hollywood standards, though.
g) Good Dick
Kind of a weird movie that started with a strong enough premise but I didn't really like where they took it, the kind of movie I'd only watch on cable up at 3am when I can't sleep. Also hated that it ended with the same "whispered dialogue you can't hear" move as Lost In Translation.
h) The Women
You wanna know how bad Meg Ryan's plastic surgery has gotten? The first hour or so that my wife had this on, I thought it was Michelle Pfeiffer.
i) Surf's Up
On a technical level I'm fascinated by how digitally animated movies have gotten closer and closer to simulating a real three dimensional world shot with a camera, that can go in and out of focus or change perspectives or get water on the lens. And to that effect, the mockumentary concept of this movie gives it a lot of opportunities to show off stuff like that, and it's pretty impressive. As for the actual entertainment value and overall craftmanship, it was still pretty sub-Pixar.
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