Article Content

‘2012’: You want apocalypse? You GOT apocalypse.

2012
An airplane flies through the collapsing L.A. skyline — the first of many things that Roland Emmerich destroys in his latest world-ender, “2012.”

Some movies speak for themselves. One such movie is 2012, which comes billed as the end of the world, Roland Emmerich style. This review could simply state “Roland Emmerich destroys the world for real this time” and that would probably be sufficient. If you’ve seen any of his other movies, you know more or less what to expect from Emmerich. And since you know what CGI effects are capable of in 2009, you can probably predict what the destruction of earth circa 2012 might look like.

And since you’ve seen the trailers, you know what you’re buying going in. The only question here is whether 2012 delivers what you expect respectably and entertainingly, or whether it’s a cliche-ridden, implausible, over-the-top exercise in gratuitous mayhem. (Read more…)

Why does Robert Zemeckis hate live action?

Beowulf“Ray Winstone” in Robert Zemeckis’ Beowulf. Performance capture technology turned Winstone from Average Joe into ripped superhero.

Back in the day — a long, long time ago — Robert Zemeckis was best known for directing Back to the Future and its eventual sequels. He probably became a big mainstream name with the massive success of Forrest Gump. That movie also perhaps signaled the beginning of the end for Zemeckis as a traditional live-action filmmaker (although one could argue that moment was earlier signaled by his helming of the then-groundbreaking animation-combined-with-live-action Who Framed Roger Rabbit?).

With Forrest Gump, Zemeckis played with the notion of compositing live action with archival footage, allowing Tom Hanks to appear in the same shots as TV footage of President Nixon, among plenty of others. It was a gimmick that Zemeckis later employed in Contact, in order to merge the movie with footage of President Clinton in press conferences.

If you watch the special features on the Contact DVD (or maybe it was the VHS tape, to be honest), you see that Zemeckis’ penchant for tweaking existing images began in earnest with that film: He found that when the skies in particular outdoor shots weren’t “interesting” enough, he could replace them with skies that had better-looking clouds. I think it was this sort of “because I can” mentality that guided Zemeckis’ career into the 2000s. (Read more…)

Why does Roland Emmerich hate the world?

2012What! Fucking! Ian guy?! There was a time that John Cusack had girlfriend problems. Now he’s a dad occupying the foreground framed by the background of Roland Emmerich disasters. (Columbia Pictures/Sony)

On Friday, the much-advertised gargantuan-FX behemoth 2012 comes out. The film is the latest world-destroying epic from director Roland Emmerich, perhaps best known for his entertaining world-destroying Independence Day, his not-so-entertaining NY-destroying Godzilla ’98 and his decidedly ungood world-destroyed-by-climate-change The Day After Tomorrow.

He also made the passable history-as-a-Mel-Gibson-revenge-melodrama The Patriot and the lame pyramids-built-by-aliens Stargate.

Independence Day, probably Emmerich’s best entertainment, worked on its chosen level of lightweight summer popcorn movie (with the question of just how much the destruction of the world could be portrayed as lightweight being answered, “quite a bit”). The White House and Empire State Building blown up! Awesomely!

Godzilla was a bad movie, with its annoying characters and mindless destruction for the sake of destruction. And The Day After Tomorrow was pretty lame. I just can’t abide the end of that movie, where the characters were RUNNING AWAY FROM LETHALLY COLD AIR, as if you can escape the flow of air by RUNNING TO A DIFFERENT ROOM. (Read more…)

‘At the Movies’ reboot unbooted

File this one under “they told you so.” About a year ago, Roger Ebert and Richard Roeper left “Ebert & Roeper & the Movies” after Disney-ABC Television attempted to retool the show into something that it wasn’t. Ebert, who owns the trademarks for “Thumbs Up” and “Thumbs Down” had already been in less-than-successful negotiations with Disney over their acquisition of the trademarks. When Disney announced that “At the Movies” would be evolving its format into something else, negotiations apparently broke down completely, and Ebert and Roeper both walked away. (Read more…)

‘Transformers 2’: Less than meets the eye. Much less.

TransformersMichael Bay in a nutshell: Megan Fox and Shia LaBeouf run away from one of many, many explosions in Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen.

Complaining about Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen after you’ve actually paid to go see it is kind of like complaining after commanding someone to punch you in the face. They might not have done it the way you wanted them to do it, but you sort of knew what you were getting yourself into. It’s kind of your own fault.

Such is the case with the latest behemoth from Michael friggin’ Bay. It’s overblown to the point of absurdity, and yet I feel like an a-hole for complaining that it’s overblown, because, well, of course it’s overblown. I saw the trailer, didn’t I? I knew that going in. And I read other reviews that said the movie was bad. What was I expecting?

I sort of liked the first Transformers. On the guilty-pleasure scale I gave it a three-star rating, simply because, again, I knew what I was getting into, and the movie delivered on its silly level. And it made me laugh. And the voice of Optimus Prime was … the real voice of Optimus Prime, Peter Cullen. Which was awesome. Overall, it was sort of a more-frenetic, less-classy Independence Day. (Read more…)

The war officially ends today

After two years, the war is finally over. I’m talking, of course, about the format war between rival high-def next-generation DVD formats HD DVD (manufactured by Toshiba) and Blu-ray (Sony).

The writing has been on the wall for about a month now, as media companies — some that had remained neutral until recently — have been slowly aligning themselves into Blu-ray’s camp and tipping the scales of the stalemate. But today Toshiba made it official with their announcement that they will discontinue all manufacturing operations for HD DVD players. (Read more…)

A public service announcement from David Lynch

The Internet is the future of video, as has been proven by the WGA strike (which looks to be officially ending this week). But watching movies on the Internet is still not a particularly good option, in my opinion. It can provide a substitute in a pinch, but with current technology and bandwidth, it’s not a way I would ever choose to watch a movie, given the alternative. (Read more…)

Obviously, you’re not a golfer

101107-lebowski.jpgMark that frame an eight, and you’re entering a world of pain. Walter (John Goodman) brings it all back to Nam, while the Dude (Jeff Bridges) abides, and Donny (Steve Buscemi) shuts the fuck up, in the Coen brothers’ The Big Lebowski (1998).

If you don’t understand immediately what the headline of this blog entry means, then obviously, you’re not a Duder.

Everybody quotes movies. But some of us quote movies more often than others, and some movies get quoted a whole hell of a lot more than others.

With us (the royal we, the editorial), it’s The Big Lebowski, which for my money might be the most quotable movie of all time — and yes that includes Pulp Fiction and anything else by Tarantino.

I remember the first time I saw The Big Lebowski. I actually saw it in the theater when it was first released. I saw it in a movie theater that had maybe 15 or 20 people in it. (It was a niche movie then. Now, it’s more of a mainstream cult film, hence conventions like Lebowski Fest.) (Read more…)

HD DVD? Blu-ray? None of the above, for now.

Remember in the 1980s when VHS and Betamax duked it out? Apparently the manufacturers of the future of home video have not learned from past mistakes (or, more specifically, they don’t much care that consumers will by and large stand on the sidelines while they duke it out), and we’re doomed to repeat the Format War for the future of DVD. (Read more…)

Three movie directors with too much hype

I sometimes wonder how it is that certain movie directors earn enough cachet in Hollywood to become name brands. Sure, I can understand the idea of a “name brand” being applied to the likes of Steven Spielberg or Martin Scorsese or a dozen others — although it should be noted that Spielberg is more of a “brand” (because of his mainstream appeal) whereas Scorsese is more of a guy who is thought of as a famous and respected director rather than a “brand.” (Read more…)