[Movie Monday] Slumdog Millionaire

I saw Danny Boyle's latest yesterday, in the midst of all the post-Oscar hype, and as a fan of his previous work, I was prepared to like it a whole lot. Little did I know.

Holy crap, how overrated is this film? I don't mean to sound like the typical Internet critic douche, but come ON. Far from Boyle's finest, let alone the best film of 2008. Sure, it's better than the Beach, but what the Hell people.

My main gripe is the fact that it feels like there's a huge disconnect between the two parts of the movie, kind of a reverse La Vitta é Bella, in a sense. In this case, the first part is a gritty, dark and realistic drama, while the second part is something of a Bollywood farce with an old-Hollywood forced happy ending. But between the two, there's no real link, nothing that glues them together. Even the characters feel like completely different people.

I feel the need to emphasise just how forced the happy ending is. Of all the horrible clichés storytellers can use to pull their characters out of the shitholes they've dug for them, fate and predetermination are amongst the very worst. I don't mean to get all philosophical about the nature of choice and whether we are in control of our destinies, but as a storytelling technique alone, it's just lazy. It sends out the message that if you're meant to be awesome, you barely have to try. The right answer will come to you anyway. Of course, if it wasn't written that you'd be awesome, you're royally butt-fucked. Hooray!

Now, I don't mean to sound grumpy and imply that happy endings, especially forced ones, are necessarily bad. They work just fine in goofy movies such as A Life Less Ordinary (incidentally, another Boyle film) but in a gritty, realistic drama, ehhhh... that's asking too much from poor ol' Ms. Suspension of Disbelief.

Don't even get me started at the dancing scene at the end.

The Final Verdict:

2 out of 5 (Zelda) rupees.

TL;DR Version

Academy awards are becoming more and more like mercy fucks lately.

[Movie Saturday] Guy Richie's Sherlock Holmes?

So apparently there's another movie based on Sherlock Holmes besides the one starring Borat,* and it's going to be directed by none other than Guy "I'm Madonna's husband!" Richie.


Regarding the actors that are going to play Holmes and Watson, Robert Downey Jr. is pretty much a given as the legendary detective himself, and Jude Law is in talks for the role of Dr. Watson.

Now, as far as I am concerned**, Guy Richie has only made one good movie:

And it was fucking awesome. So awesome in fact, that a couple of years later, Richie understood he'd never make a better movie, and thus decided to remake it with a little extra something (i.e. Brad Pitt) added, and called it Snatch. Audiences, unsurprisingly, fell for it.

Cynicism aside, I'm not entirely convinced that Richie can do justice to the dry, absolutely logical world that Sherlock Holmes lives in. Richie's style is quite different, his world is one of petty criminals who make for adorable losers, and witty one-liners. Of course, this is only by judging what he has done so far, I'd love to be proven wrong as I'm a huge fan of the original novels.

Another thing I'd love to be proven wrong is this feeling in my gut that's telling me that only an Englishman could ever do the role of Holmes justice. Hugh Laurie (A.K.A. Gregory House) is too obvious a choice, but Robert Downey Jr. is a fantastic actor that really does complex roles justice with his performances. So if anyone can pull it off, I think that's him.

Truth be told, it would have worked great

As for any people that will complain about Jude Law, pull your head out of your ass before you suffocate. Watson never played second string in the novels, so it's important to have a charismatic actor for the role. Not to mention that Watson was described as a handsome man, and also that Law is a great actor in his own right, despite his "pretty boy" looks. So get over yourselves.

At any rate, I'd be thankful if the finished movie doesn't end up being like this:



* I like parodies as much as the next guy, but I honestly can't see how this movie is going to be any good.

** I haven't seen RockaRolla yet though, and that's supposed to be a return to form for him. Its name also reminds me of a Judas Priest song.

TL;DR version:

On the bright side, even if both new Sherlock Holmes movies end up sucking, we'll always have the BBC series which is magnificently brilliant:

[Off-Topic Sunday] Random news

The Internet monster, combined with an electrical outage ate my earlier post, but oh well. I'll just rewrite it.

On with the news then. One of my favorite games of all time, Dreamfall, has finally been released on the Xbox Originals lines of Xbox Live, even though it was supposed to come out four months ago. (via RagnarTornquist.com)

Better late than never, I guess. I've said it before, this game has a fantastic story and some of the best characters in a videogame. Play it!

Moving on, the new Futurama movie, Bender's Game, has a release date, November 4, 2008. A new Futurama movie is always good news, and I like the extra emphasis on Bender but... I hope it's better than the previous one, which I found to be pretty disappointing, even though I'm practically starving for more Futurama. (via TVshowsOnDVD.com)

And lastly, footage of the upcoming X-Men Origins: Wolverine movie has been released online, though it's hardly an official trailer. It looks... alright, I guess. You can find its two parts here and here, for the time being, but they might be pulled down rather quickly.

I'm keeping my expectations low, since X-Men 3 broke my heart (the Phoenix/Dark Phoenix saga is one of my fave stories), but this movie could be good. X-Men 2/Spider-Man 2/Iron Man good. The potential is there, with the character and the cast, let's hope the story is up to the task.

I like how they tease us with a scene of young James Howlett, I just hope the Origin references will be meaningful and not tacked on. Although, for a movie that's not supposed to be about the entire X-Men team, it sure has a lot of guest stars. Sabretooth (makes sense), DEADPOOOL, that other dude from Weapon-X I can't remember, Gambit. And was that Husk, from Gen-X? I could swear it was her.

At any rate, Wolvie is one of Marvel's best characters and he deserves a good movie. Hopefully they won't mess this up.

TL;DR version:

I hate Gambit. True story.

Also, I want a Deadpool movie. R rated, please.

[Movie Saturday] The X-Files - Do YOU want to believe?

It's already been ten years since the first X-Files movie, Fight the Future. Excluding the fact that time flew by so disturbingly fast, only now have we finally managed to get a sequel to that movie, six whole years after the show's (insultingly bad) finale.

I got back from seeing the new movie, I Want to Believe, a little while ago. I really cannot be objective with this movie, as I was a huge fan of the TV show way back when (I never called my self an X-Phile though, thank the gods), so this movie was like a wish being fulfilled for me, than anything else.

Before I get into the movie itself, I feel the need to rant a little. You may skip the next three paragraphs if you're only interested in reading about the movie.

It's been an entire decade since the last X-Files movie. So many things have changed since. Back in '98, the show had just finished its fifth and most successful season ever, and it topped that with a movie that was a direct continuation of the season finale that used a better budget and longer length to really take its alien-invasion/government conspiracy storyline to new heights. It may have alienated the casual viewer, but to fans of the show like myself, it was a fantastic movie. Sadly, things only went downhill from there. The next two seasons were alright, but nowhere near the quality of their predecessors, and the last two were just plain bad, culminating to that insult of a finale that I mentioned earlier.

Furthermore, one thing I cannot overstate enough is how different decades the 90's and the 00's are. I'm not sure if it were just the result of lucky timing, or the creators of the X-Files really caught the spirit of the times. Things like alien abductions, the possibility of contact with an alien civilization, Roswell, conspiracy theories involving the government and possible cover-ups of evidence relating to all the above... Those things were huge during the last decade. Don't forget that about 2% of all Americans claimed to have been abducted by aliens in their life. Aliens and conspiracy theories were the hysteria of the decade.


This decade, however, is a lot darker and serious, our fears more mundane and realistic. Nobody cares about aliens anymore, we only fear terrorists and the fact that we might not be able to afford our next rent, or the ever-increasing price of oil, etc. Conspiracy theories seem outdated, as people don't care about Roswell anymore, everyday problems have a much bigger appeal, if you can call it that. Can the X-Files still be relevant at this time, when most people have outgrown their alien conspiracy theory phase?

(mild spoilers from here on, nothing too serious though)

These were the reservations I had with the movie prior to seeing it, and combined with the fact that early word of mouth was pretty discouraging, it made my expectations really, really low. Which, in retrospect, was probably a good thing. Because, and I'll get this out of the way now, I liked I Want to Believe, but I didn't love it, though I did try.



It was perhaps due to the limited appeal of aliens nowadays that the creators of IWtB decided to tackle a new, original story, along perhaps with the fact that it has been six whole years since the show ended and even fans of the show will have forgotten all the details. That, and also the fact that by the time the show ended, its mythology had become such a clusterfuck that nobody knew what was going on, and nobody would bother to remember. At any rate, the story of IWtB is a much more down to earth, tame kind of story.

Did it really have to be so tame, though? The mystery that Mulder and Scully face is pretty mundane, perhaps not even real X-Files material, despite the presence of gay Russian Cylons. If IWtB had aired like a two-part filler episode during the show's run, nobody would have noticed a difference, and most would have considered it rather forgettable as well. The action scenes are mediocre, and most suspensful scenes are far too predictable. There are several hints at something larger and deeper, as well as references to the show itself, but on the whole, the story feels lacking. Although the fact that the one piece of information that ultimately solves the case was taken from a real-life event (link - SPOILERS) was pretty neat.

One thing that I really liked though was the fact that the FBI had to turn to Mulder when they had run out of leads, undoubtedly a reference to the fact that, in his hayday, Mulder was the Bureau's finest profiler. It's an easy thing to forget about Mulder, given the emphasis on his "Spooky" persona, but he always was a brilliant detective and researcher.

Though, I have to ask, what the fuck was up with Scully doing research on stem cell surgery by googling the damn thing? She's supposed to be a brilliant scientist, if she doesn't have books on the subject, surely she knows what sites she should check, geebus. In my eyes, it felt like an attempt to appeal to the younger demographic, a way of saying "see, we still know how things are done!" that falls flat on its face and makes for some really poor storytelling. It's just one scene though, so I'll let it slide. Though the whole subplot with the sick kid did feel a bit uncessesary in general.

What makes this movie is its two iconic protagonists, Mulder and Scully. I can't imagine how someone who has never seen an episode of the series would ever pick up one tenth of what's going on between the two characters, which in a sense is rather strange for a movie that's trying to be stand-alone, but for a fan it's a real treat. The movie explores most familiar themes between the two, such as Mulder's belief (thus vindicating the title, despite the lack of aliens) and Scully's pragmatism, in a way that is both endearing and enjoyable. I'll be damned if Duchovny doesn't look much older than he used to, though.

I got carried away again, as if I were an English major or something, so I'll get right to the conclusion. Can an X-Files movie still be relevant today? Yes, somewhat. The fact that IWtB had a whole new plot behind it definitely helped, murder mysteries never get old after all. Add to that two characters that are really strong and deep, even by today's standards, and the foundation is there.

Sadly, the plot itself is weak and predictable, and the two protagonists will probably appeal the most only to seasoned viewers of the show. Which makes me wonder, if you're making a movie targetted mainly at fans of the show, why not relate it to the overall mythology, or at least hint to it? I don't get it. Hopefully, the next movie (if we ever get one) will provide that.

As a long-time fan of the show, I enjoyed it and I expect most other fans starving for some Fox&Dana goodness will feel the same, as long as you believe (haw haw) in it. You have to watch it as an X-Files fan, not as a casual observer. Though I can definitely understand those that will not like this movie, fans or otherwise.

My final rating is 73 out of 100 sunflower seeds.

TL;DR version:

Don't mind the fact that this movie isn't as good as it should have been after having to wait ten years for it, just watch it anyway. This way, we might actually get a real sequel to the series that deals with the inevitable alien invasion (spoilers OLOL) that the wretched episode called The Truth never got around to dealing with.

I also wanted to make a mean joke about that hospital that's being run by priests and nuns, but I'm drawing a blank. I'll get back to it.

Lastly, it sure feels weird watching a movie were snow has covered everything and it's like minus fuck-all degrees, when it's the middle of the summer in real life. Kind of like watching a rerun of a Christmas episode during Easter.

[Movie Saturday] The Dark Knight

I watched it yesterday.

It's as good as people would have you think. It's exactly what I expected from the movie after the ending of Batman Begins and that wonderful scene with Gordon's speech about escalation and the introduction of the Joker card.

Believe the hype, especially about Ledger.

Watch. This. Movie.

TL;DR version:

There's so many things I want to say about this movie, but I'm not sure where to start. I'll give it a try anyway.

(SPOILERS AHEAD)

It really is different to every movie based on a comic book that came before it. Even Batman Begins. The Dark Knight feels like more like a serious cop drama starring a guy in a bat suit, rather than a spandex action flick. It's the perfect rendition of those dark, serious, gritty Batman graphic novels, rather than the average "villain of the week" Detective comics issue written by some random hack, which is what the Schumacher Batman films felt like, by the way.

I understand some people, and especially critics, did not like the movie exactly for that reason, that it tries to be something more than an action film with superheroes. Well, fuck me. There's just no pleasing some people, is there?

Personally, I absolutely loved the direction they took with this movie. It felt true to the source material, the graphic novels as I mentioned above, and it made for a more realistic, genuinely interesting movie. Not exactly a more "fun" movie, but Bruce Wayne was never about the fun to begin with.

Performances as a whole were amazing. People seem to hate Bale's Batman voice, but I didn't mind it. Hell, if somebody just kicked your ass and then talks to you like that, you will be intimidated. Caine and Freeman were outstanding in their roles, and their characters are excellent foils to Bruce Wayne, while Gyllenhaal did an excellent work with Rachel, even though her screen time is pretty limited. The actor who really surprised me, however, was Aaron Eckhart's portrayal of Harvey Dent and Two-Face (I told ya about those spoilers!) From being the White Knight of Gotham to the psycho killer with the gruesome face injury, Exkhart did a tremendous job. While the story of Dent's fall itself could perhaps do with a little more (just a bit) development, his performance more than makes up for it.

I loved the story of Dent's fall in The Long Halloween, but the version offered in this movie makes perfect sense in the confines of the movie itself. Two-Face wasn't set up to be a major villain, but more of a character to illustrate a point. Or perhaps two points, those being the Joker's point that everyone can be corrupted, and Alfred's warning about not knowing when and where to stop. But that is another story altogether.

I purposely didn't mention Heath Ledger's performance as the Joker so far, as I was expecting that he'd be great. I've already confessed to being a fan of his, and the trailers alone made his performance really seem like something special. Only the trailers said part of the story, and the actual performance was better than I expected. I honestly had to remind myself that this was Ledger, an actor playing a role, and not a real lunatic sociopath. He makes the role seem so natural, it's downright absurd. We're talking about a guy with a face full of makeup, wearing a purple tax, this seriously shouldn't look realistic!

And yet he pulled it off. From the way he delivered his lines ("Hiiiii!") to his body language, to his humor, to his worldview and the way he conducts things... If he doesn't get a place in the pantheon of greatest, most iconic, movie villains of all time (fuck the Oscars), alongside Hannibal Lecter, Norman Bates and HAL 9000, it'll be a great injustice. His death was a terrible loss, especially after such a role which fully illustrates what an amazing talent he had. Damnit, Heath.

Seven paragraphs in, and I haven't even talked about the story. And I could easily spend more than seven paragraphs talking about it, but since it's kinda late I'll keep it to two. Much like Eckhart's performance, I wasn't really expecting the story to be so deep, so engaging. I was expecting it to have a strong story, but nothing spectacular, much like Batman Begins. Boy, was I wrong. There's so much there, so many themes, allusions, symbolism, social commentary, Hell the Joker's rants alone strike eerily, if not uncomfortably, close to home when it comes to human nature. And the best thing about all these elements is the fact that none are heavy-handed, or presented in a preachy manner.

I'll speak about my favorite examples of such storytelling techniques in a later post since I want to digest them fully before I do so, but if I were to mention one that comes to mind right now, it would be the Jokers speech on rules, plans, people's obsession with them and how that's illustrated perfectly with Harvey Dent. It was part of a plan that made Dent lie about being the man behind the Batman mask, a plan that was supposed to help them capture the Joker and ultimately lead the good guys to win. And it would have worked, had two corrupted cops decided to not play by Dent's rules, and instead betray him, ultimately leading to the death of his fianceé and his own horrible mal/transformation. Yet still, even after Dent lost half his face and his soul, he had to cling to a set of rules. He wouldn't kill the woman who betrayed his trust, because his own (new) rules prohibited him from doing so. In a way, even in insanity, Dent stubbornly based his only hope for sense in the world in his morality code, even if it were as arbitrary as the flip of a coin. And there's another point to be made about luck here, but I won't get into that right now.

Was there something I didn't like? Well, that whole cell-phone based sonar felt a bit tacky and didn't quite fit with the rest of the movie, although it did help paint a very amoralistic image of Batman. Which, incidentally, is one of my favorite parts of the story, and which I really want to get to in a future post.

(Goes to show how much I liked the movie when I mention positive things in the paragraph about the things I didn't like, doesn't it?)

Another thing would be the lack of music during some of the action scenes, I've been spoiled by the wonderful theme and would really like to hear it more often. In a similar note, I felt like we didn't hear the Joker's laugh enough times, but then again we'll probably sleep more easily this way. Lastly, the cynic in me believes that had the two ferries incident taken place in real life, at least one of the boats would have ended up exploding, and that they kind of dropped the ball with that one. Then again, I'll be the first to admit that I may be a bit too cynical, not to mention that I've been completely conditioned by the Song of Ice and Fire series, where people are dying left and right. Plus, I'm not sure that agreeing with the Joker on the nature of human beings is a good thing to do.

Did I ever mention that most, if not all, things and situations remind me of a joke? Because they do.

[Movie Saturday] The Max Payne movie

If there is a list out there named "Best videogames with the worst names ever", Max Payne is definitely high up that list, alongside such games as Banjo-Tooie and The Legend of Zelda: Link's and Terra's Excellent Adventure. Seriously, naming a shooter game, and even its protagonist, Max Pain... That takes balls. Huge, gigantic, balls.

Max Payne and its 2003 sequel are highly stylized third-person shooters, with a presentation that's quite different to most games, and the first game to incorporate "that Matrix slow-motion thing" effect in its gameplay. So effectively in fact that this effect has ever since been called Bullet Time, a name first coined by the developers of this game.


Max Payne is effectively a film noir game, with its story focusing on a framed cop with an aptitude for brooding monologues. One of the most impressive aspects of the game's presentation were the cutscenes, which were presented in the form a page ripped directly out of a graphic novel, with speech bubbles and all. While the story itself was fairly convoluted and quite frankly bonkers, as a rule of the thumb, I prefer a pretentious yet witty story over a completely brainless one. And seeing a shooter with a story that's not utterly brainless was definitely a welcome change.


As I was reading through the manual of the very first Max Payne all the way back in 2002, I noticed something very interesting; it was alluding to a Max Payne movie that was already in the works and should have been released "soon". Well, fast forward seven years after that piece was written (in 2001, for you math types out there), we're finally getting this movie. It will be based on the first movie, Valkyr drug and all, with a few rumored aspects of the second game making it as well.

The cast looks solid, Mark "Marky Mark" Wahlberg is set to play Max and has proved himself to be a very competent actor, with gruff, brooding characters being something of a specialty of his. And then there's Mila Kunis who's... well, hot. I'm a bit worried about the director though, John Moore, who was responsible for such atrocities as Behind Enemy Lines and the 2006 version of The Omen, but I'm willing to keep an open mind.


What I'm really worried about, however, is the movie's rating, which has been confirmed to be a PG-13. I honestly do not get it. The original game is a dark, violent tale of a man's bloody and gory path towards redemption. There's a lot of violence, swearing, and everything else you might expect from such a tale. A PG-13 all but ensures that the movie will have little of those. Hell, you can't even have an actor smoke a cigarette anymore with that rating. It seems you can't do anything fun in a movie these days anymore without having the censors running after you.

Stop!

That blows my mind, really. I'm not a violent person (that incident where I broke a PS2 controller while playing P.E.S notwithstanding), in fact I abhor mindless violence. I also don't smoke. Okay, so I swear all the fucking time, but that's not the point here. Swearing and violence make sense in the context of the world where the game takes place. It's a dark place, where things aren't fair where bad things happen to good people all the time. And its protagonist is a man bent on revenge, who while on his quest for vengeance, not only becomes as bad as the people he's hunting, he arguably becomes worse.

So yes, I believe that the freedom given by an "R" rating is what is needed to bring Max Payne's dark world into the silver screen (clichés ahoy!) properly. It goes without saying that you can have a serious, violent, story with even the most vibrant pastel colors, but in the case of the Max Payne movie, it's also about staying true to its roots.


An example that comes to mind are the two Alien Versus Predator movies. While I'm far from being a fan of either one, the first movie went for a PG-13 rating that was completely out of place for fans of both original franchises, which were both really damn violent. The result was an overwhelming disappointment for most people. The sequel, AVP: Requiem, went for an "R" rating, and while that alone didn't make it a better movie, it definitely made it feel more true to its sources.

I for one liked AVP:R more than its predecessor though, and a quite fun movie on its own rights, but others would disagree. Oh, well.


And, to go back to Max Payne, if nothing else, Hell. How can you have a film noir without anyone smoking? That's just not right.

All this bitching aside, the first trailer for this movie is looking really damn good. They've captured the style and atmosphere of the games, Wahlberg is looking good in his role, and the action scenes seem suspensful. If not for the rating thing, I'd be sold on this movie already. Here's the actual trailer itself, so you can make up your own minds:



TL;DR version:

While there's still time for Max Payne the movie to fuck up everything the game stood for, The Dark Knight premieres on Thursday, and that one has been rated awesome. Not to mention that we're getting the new X-Files movie the week after this, though I'm a bit worried about that one.

[Video Friday] A few videos for your amusement

First of all, happy 4th if July to those that applies (Americans for their Independence Day, and Greeks for their "Holy Fuck We Won the Euro" day). The menu of the day has three videos and two crazy stories for you.

Let's start with the heart-worming story of Christian the Lion. He was found as a cub by two men, who then took him and raised him as a pet. Naturally, you can't keep an adult lion as a pet, which is a damn shame if you ask me, so they eventually released him. When they saw him again after several years... well, look for yourselves:



I always wanted a lion as a pet when I was a kid, now I find myself wanting one again. ;_;

(Via Neogaf.com)

Now that you're all warm and fuzzy inside, check this story out, about a man who found out that his girlfriend was an assassin. Not a ninja assassin, as I thought at first glance (for whatever reason), but an assassin nonetheless. Amusingly, this story is bound to become a Hollywood movie, but one gets the feeling that it already has been, in one form or another. Talk about life imitating art imitating life.

(Via Neogaf.com)

And since that fuzziness inside you is probably starting to dissipate, here's a really dark and gloomy PvP video from World of Warcraft, called Diary of a Corruptor. This isn't exactly a machinima like last week's In For A Penny, but it's one of those videos that people can find entertaining even if they are not familiar with the game itself.

I understand it's kind of cheating to have this video today, but I honestly think it makes for an interesting watch for everyone. Visually it's very interesting, with top-notch editing, the soundtrack is what can be described as "awesome, dude" and the mood is fantastic. It should also be of interest to WoW players as it's from the perspective of an Affliction Warlock, as rare a breed these days as the Mutilate Rogue I used to play. Sorry, I'll start using English again.

Did I mention that it has several themes from the Silent Hill games? It's part of the reason why it's here, I'm extremely biased towards those games and their soundtracks. Watch it already:


Diary of a Corruptor - Unstable Affliction PvP from Sorrow on Vimeo.

Going from the spooky to the "What the Hell?", the story that's been in the news all day today is about that pregnant man who finally gave birth to a baby girl. If you haven't heard about this already, just read the article, I can't do justice to the... irregularity of that story.

And lastly, something different to the deluge of nuttiness, an Animaniacs compilation! A few of the best lines from their "Wheel of Morality" segment:



TL;DR version:

Muffins.

Scheduled downtime

Easter vacation is finally upon us in the Orthodox world and one of my best friends is getting married in a few days in my hometown. So these add up to a good excuse for me to visit that hellhole. I'm not exactly thrilled about it, and I'm not sure how long I'll stay, since I'm supposed to join the army on May 12. We'll see how it goes.

As a parting gift, here's a leaked trailer from the new X-Files movie, though I wouldn't be surprised if it's pulled off YouTube in a few hours.




TL;DR version:

Cookies.

The Truth Will Be Out There, soon

The official title for the upcoming, second, X-Files movie has been revealed. Its name? "I Want to Believe"

Truth be told, it does sound a bit corny. But as a long-time uh... X-Phile (first time I've ever used that term, I swear), I like it. It's one of the key phrases used in the series, it's almost catchy, and it just feels right for an X-Files movie. Not to mention that it's just a damn title, and most titles suck to begin with. Attack of the Clones, Sanity's Requiem, The Forbidden Kingdom, hell even Fight the Future, which sounds almost as bad as "war on terror."

Though X-Files: Cultural Learnings of Aliens For Make Benefit Glorious Planet of Earth does have a certain ring to it.

Also, never forget, bitches:


The name is fine.

TL;DR version:

New X-Files movie has a slightly less-than-common name, but at the end of the day it's a new X-Files movie. Stop doubting, start believing.

Help make the world a better place

As of today I'm adding a tl;dr segment to all my posts, regardless of length.

I'm not sure how many people in the world are familiar with a certain German director called Uwe Boll. He is responsible for some of the most unintentionally hilarious, comically amateurish, downright awful movies in the history of the multiverse. It should be noted that most of his movies so far have been based on videogame franchises, though none of them were what we call triple-A quality titles. His credits include House of the Dead, BloodRayne and the only movie to ever make me lose my appetite, Alone in the Dark. AitD was so depressingly bad, I couldn't find the will to speak, or even eat, while watching it. And as anyone who knows me will testify, there's precious few things that can make me lose my appetite.

As with most bad things, there's always some who will suggest that his movies are so bad that they're actually good, some weird sort of odd comical masterpieces. On that specific subject, I say bullshit. I'll admit I giggled at the train wreck that was House of the Dead, and during the first few moments of BloodRayne I thought the movie could be something of a dark, guilty pleasure, but it, along with the rest of his movies are just plain bad. Not good bad, Jesus-Christ-I-can-feel-my-brain-rotting-away bad. And there's so many of them!

It was funny the first time around, when House of the Dead was first released on the unsuspecting world, but the joke has gotten old now. In a sense, it was worth watching HotD just to see just how bad a movie can get, but with every consecutive movie it's becoming painfully obvious; Uwe Boll movies aren't worth watching, even if it's just for shits and giggles. It's like those jokes that people feel the need to continue on making, even though somebody killed it several minutes ago. Perhaps a 30 minutes long fart joke, if you will.

Not to mention that it seems like Uwe Boll himself is a colossal jackass. Back in 2006 he staged the "Raging Boll" event, where he, former light-weight boxer, could take on people who criticized his movies, i.e skinny Internet geeks. Naturally, it takes balls of steel to kick the living shit out of scrawny teenagers* but that wasn't the whole story. Boll was offered an actual fight by another former boxer, and creator of the Broken Saints series, Brooke Burgess, and the way he reacted to that, well... You should read the whole story as offered by Burgess himself in his blog, the article is called Raging Dickhead.

Now that you have a good idea of who we're talking about, let's get to the point. As mentioned in this article, Boll has claimed that he will quit making movies if one million people tell him to stop. Unsurprisingly, there's already an online petition about this, with a 5-digit number of signatures already. I have to confess I don't believe that Boll will go through with this, even if the petition reaches one million signatures, which in itself is also unlikely. I also hate online petitions, as I've probably mentioned in the past. But hey, this is a good cause, so get to it!

Also unsurprisingly, a number of Uwe Boll apologists have appeared throughout the Interwebs, claiming that if people don't like his movies they can just not watch them, and also that this is just gamers getting their panties up in a bunch because they're afraid that Boll will "discredit" their favorite medium. First of all, the "if you don't like it, don't bother with it" argument is as old as the counter-argument "the only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good people to do nothing" and both are equally shitty, so that's all I'm going to say on that one. As for fears of Boll discrediting games through his movies, that is completely unfounded. Not only because games and movies based on them are different entities, but more importantly, most movies based on videogames are already complete turds, regardless of whom they've been directed by.

It does seem that Boll has his own sort of fun while directing these atrocities of his, so I am not going to suggest he should stop making movies altogether, I'm not that mean. However, instead of finding inventive ways to fund his movies and luring good actors and actresses in them, effectively staining their names for all eternity, he should do what all other talentless amateurs do: Gather a bunch of friends, find a handycam and post the results on YouTube. He could even become a cult icon in that cesspool of humanity. Everyone's happy.

(Unless he becomes such a cult hit that he goes back to making movies. I doubt the world is that cruel, though.)

TL;DR version:

Douchebag German director says he'll stop making his shitty movies if enough people tell him to do so. Help prove that humanity isn't beyond redemption by signing this petition.

* That is to say, I don't condone the level of abuse some people have given Boll, which borderlines on stalking. I do think he needs to stop making movies though.

"Taken" teaser

I bought Gears of War on Monday (slightly used, but only for 30 euros!) so I've been spending most of the last 30 hours or so on it. This game is pure awesome, even though this is my third playthrough I'm having loads of fun. Probably the only game in recent years I don't mind playing again and again, because it has that special sort of quality that games like Doom, Goldeneye and Halo did. I haven't found the word for it yet.

Anyway, I just came across this trailer for the upcoming movie Taken, which looks pretty badass. Has quite a few good actors in it, I'm a Liam Neeson fanboi, though Maggie Grace kind of sucks, and it's directed by the same French dude that did District 13. The latter is one of the best action films of the decade, do yourself a favor and look for it if you haven't seen it, it's worth the trouble. The teaser is here:



House actually liked somebody? Mind-blowing.

Guillermo Del Toro to direct The Hobbit

Hello.

Yes, I know. Long time no see. As I've said a few times before, this is a slow month. Plus with me having a new console after so long, I haven't been particularly inspired with writing anything. It's much easier to shoot people dead in Halo 3. I'm loving the matchmaking system they've implemented, too, as it helps hopelessly bad players such as myself to avoid all the "pros" and "elites" out there. Much love.

Anyway, cult-favorite Mexican director Guillermo Del Toro has been rumored (or should that be pretty much confirmed?) selected to film the movie adaptation of J.R.R. Tolkien's The Hobbit. After the success of the Lord of the Rings trilogy, it was inevitable that this movie would be someday made, and after Peter Jackson announced that he wouldn't be involved in directing the Hobbit, most people were rather skeptical. Myself included.

But I think this is good news. As a fan of both of Del Toro's commercial projects (Hellboy, I even liked Mimic. But not Blade 2) and his more low-key, more personal films (The Devil's Backbone, Pan's Labyrinth) I'm quite pleased to hear he's, probably, going to be the man to direct the Hobbit. He has both the artistic vision to make sure the movie will stay true to its roots, and hopefully add his special kind of eerie, surreal horror to it, as well as the necessary knowledge on how to make a commercially successful movie. And let's face it, this is going to be a big, expensive project, and it will have to be a box office hit. Not that this is a bad thing, unlike what some people would have you thinking.

New House M.D episode tonight, too! The wait has been long, but it's definitely worth it, as we're getting three episodes in eight days (today, on Superbowl Sunday and again next Tuesday.) Of course the wait after that is going to be even longer, but y'know, shtuff happens.

A Christmas Carol

This is a bit late, but I had a few drinks earlier and then I was dragged into a heroic Mechanar run (that being a dungeon in WoW. Yes, I played WoW on Christmas day. I am doomed). On the bright side, I'm three badges away from my Ninja boots.

In any case, it was Christmas today. A lot of people are ranting about how commercialized it all is, how the only point of these celebrations is to get you to spent money and how it's all useless and all that. Well, I find that it's only useless and meaningless if you spent your money on shit you can neither afford nor really need. Yes, the use of the word "shit" really is needed here. However, there's nothing wrong with buying a little gift that's gonna make you a little happier than usual (*hint hint, nudge nudge* Buy me Guitar Hero 3 please.)

Which brings me to the other thing; people complaining about being forced to be happy over the holiday season. I do agree that you're practically forced to be "cheerful and merry" over this time of year, but let's face it: Being happy is much more fun than being all glum. I see the holiday season as an excuse to forget about the things that bring me down on a daily basis, and try to be a little less gloomy than usual. That's all there is to it.

Don't forget, you might get on some people's nerves by being happy, but at least you won't bore them silly, which will be the case when you're being all depressive.

On a related matter, one of the movies I loved as a kid and tried to watch on every single year was Mickey's Christmas Carol. I was a huge fan of Disney movies and comics as a kid, but this one was special to me. I was pleasantly surprised when I found it on YouTube earlier this week. I'm not quite sure how long it will remain there, but for now I'm just going to watch the movie, reminisce about the past and try not to be gloomy. It ain't that hard, you should try it too.

Watch part one here:



The rest can be found here: Part Two, Part Three, Part Four.

Merry (belated) friggin' Christmas people.

Why So Serious?

Okay, why are you here? Didn't you hear that the first trailer for The Dark Knight has come out? Go watch it now!

Back already? Alright, let me tell you why I liked it that much then. First of all, I'm not even going to try and hide the fact that I'm a huge fan of the Batman Begins movie. In fact, I'm a total nerd for it. But a lot of people were worried about the decision of Christopher Nolan, director of that film to cast Heath Ledger as the Joker, Batman's iconic adversary. That's the same Heath Ledger that was in Brokeback Mountain, yes. If there were any moronic jokes you'd like to make, now would be the time.

Anyway, I never doubted Ledger's talent as an actor, so I always believed he could pull it off. This trailer has proved me right . And the Joker was what was going to make or break this movie from the beginning. The reason? It's a character that's so difficult to portray for what he is, a sociopath and a murderer, with no reservations about... anything, really. Yet he's been presented as a simple clown with a penchant for killing all too many times, essentially more amusing (in a sick way, but still) than frightening. But the real Joker is exactly that, frightening.

He's frightening in a way that few (comic book or otherwise) villains can be. Not because he's physically imposing, he's pretty much an average Joe in that department, and in a physical fight Batman would wipe the floor with him. Nor is he really that intelligent. I mean, he is pretty damn smart, but Batman is still smarter than him, heck I doubt anyone is smarter than Batman.

No, what makes the Joker frightening, and such an excellent villain for the control-freak Batman, is the fact that he's a total nutjob of a killer. He'd kill anyone without one shred of remorse, he never feels fear about anything, he is completely amoral and chaotic and simply does not care. About anything. He's so removed from what our usual definition of a person is, that it's simply unnatural, yet still in a plausible way. And unnatural things are always scary, after all. He is almost the polar opposite of Batman, who has his own strong personal moral code, likes to have complete control over everything and go into any fight after a long and careful period of planning and preparing.

To make a gross generalization here, if Batman is supposed to be the personification of Fear (as so successfully presented in the Batman Begins movie) -then the Joker is the personification of Insanity.

And then there's the laugh... Oh gods, that laugh. Even though I'm a fan of Ledger, I was amazed that this usually low-key guy was able of pulling off that demented, hyena-like laugh that is guaranteed to send a shiver down your spine.

I know it's just a trailer, but given the quality of the first movie and Nolan's successful movie record so far, the quality of the Joker's portrayal was the major concern for most people. And if anything, the trailer has shown that it's a successful one. Just pay attention to the scenes where the Joker is licking his lips while Maggie Gylenhaal (so glad to see her replace Katie Holmes) or the scene where he sticks the upper part of his body outside of a police car. Especially that last scene, he seems so serene and carefree, almost like a child, while maintaining a rather sick expression on his face. All that while presumably trying to escape the police. Flawless.

I'm probably going to be in the army by the time the movie comes out, but what can you do? If worse comes to worst, I'll spend a few days in the army jail for bailing out of the camp. Hurr.

Cassandra and her Dream

This will be a little post on Woody Allen's latest film, Cassandra's Dream, I didn't want it to be lost in the randomness that was the "SUPRISE BUTTSECKS" earlier post.

Cassandra's Dream is the spiritual sequel of sorts to Allen's '05 film, Match Point. Similarly to that one, there's a significant lack of humor, New York, jazz music and Woody Allen himself in this movie. Some people didn't really warm up to this, having been used to Allen's movies of the last 30 years. Still, Match Point was a bigger success with the critics than Cassandra's Dream it seems.

I was never one to pay much attention to the critics, though, especially when it came to badly-received Allen movies. I openly admit to being a Woody Allen fanboy, I've loved a lot of his so-called "failures", including the Curse of the Jade Scorpion, Holywood Ending, and last year's Scoop. They're funny, witty, feel-good movies, and I genuinely have a good time watching them. I don't see why I shouldn't like them, even if they are not as deep or sophisticated as some of Allen's better movies, like Annie Hall or Hannah and her Sisters.

On a side-note, if for Allen filming one movie every year is a form of therapy, then watching said movie is a form of therapy for me. End of side-note.

Back to Cassandra's Dream, the lack of all the usual Allen trademarks doesn't hit you as bad as in Match Point, in which for the first 30 minutes I wasn't quite sure what I was watching. In Match Point it honestly felt that Allen himself wasn't quite sure where he was going either, as those first 30 minutes kind of dragged along without really going anywhere. The rest of the movie made up for that, though.

Anyway, seriously back to Cassandra's Dream now, the first thing that should get your attention is the cinematography, which is brilliant and beautiful, and the music. For the first time in ages (if not ever), Allen used original music in a movie of his, created by the acclaimed composer Phillip Glass. It really makes a difference, and helps elevate the most important parts of the movie.

As for the script of the movie itself, which has been the most criticized, while not without its faults, it's still really good. It may be somewhat predictable and perhaps not that original, but it's very deep, with a lot of allusions and metaphors, not to mention that it deals with some of Allen's (and mine) favorite themes. Death being, quite unsurprisingly, one of them, but also irony, on a cosmic level. Death because deciding who is to live and who is to die is tricky, risky business and comes with a lot of consequences, and irony because there's always a little detail that we have no power over that may very well affect the entire outcome of an event.

What came as a bit of a surprise to me was the main characters, portrayed by Ewan McGregor and Colin Farrel. While not as two-dimensional as some critics might have you think, they're still not that well-developed and feel sometimes as a little more detailed stock character, especially Farrel's Terry. This may have to do with the fact that Farrel is a terrible actor, but there's no excuse for McGregor's Ian. Ian, while brought to life by a good performance by McGregor, still feels a little like the generic ambitious underachiever.

On the other hand, the secondary characters are wonderful, and often catch you by surprise. I was especially fond of the character of Uncle Howard, an opportunist with his own moral rules. He doesn't get a lot of screen time, but he's the main driving force behind the story, he is the one that sets the brothers Ian and Terry to kill a man they don't even know, after all. I also enjoyed the father of the two boys (called simply "Mr. Blaine, we never learn his first name), he's pretty much Joe Average, but with a lot of conventional wisdom to share. Some of his lines really did catch me by surprise. And then there's Hayley Atwell's character, Angela Stark, who really makes an impression on you. I guess the character must be interesting, but Ms. Atwell is so damn beautiful you won't even care. I mean it!

All in all, I find that Cassandra's Dream is a good drama, though Match Point was indeed the better movie, and Crimes and Misdemeanors is still Allen's finest in that regard. But in its own rights, Cassandra's Dream is a fine movie, that should be enjoyed by everyone, be they Allen fans or not.

As for me, would I prefer it if Woody Allen went back to New York and filmed comedies there, under a Jazz soundtrack? Yes, I would. But I like this different batch of movies he has released lately as well, so I'm not complaining.

The Last Alterac Valley

"What's this, George? Are there no movies left on the internets besides WoW-related ones?"

There are, but this one is different. This one is from the server I'm playing, and you can even see my character in it. For a second or so. But that's besides the point.

Last Wednesday, a new patch introduced several changes to the World of Warcraft, including massive changes to the battleground everyone loves to hate, Alterac Valley.

For the uninitiated, Alterac Valley (AV for short) was designed as the most "epic" of all WoW battlegrounds, with 40 players on each side fighting over a large map, with several NPC's (non-playable characters) to fight along the way. It didn't always work, as it has been changed half a million times already, and it's always a pain to fight when you don't know anyone in your group. Even more so when everyone else is speaking Italian.

But it was a great place to fight when you had a lot of friends on your side, and especially when there was a leader than could organize attacks. Stealth teams, gathering reinforcements for the Wolf Riders (think cavalry) or the War Riders (think bombing runs), and let's not forget the huge boss that you could summon after significant effort, which got stronger with each player it killed.

Yes, AV was fun. After the last batch of changes was announced however, some of us were disheartened to hear that most of these NPC's would be removed. For that reason, we decided to have one last fight in the "old" AV, one in which we planned to completely dominate.

More than 30 of us joined, the fight lasted a little over two hours (it might sound like a lot, but the old old AV fights sometimes lasted more than twenty) and it was an almost flaweless victory, though we did lose one Lieutenant near the end. He was properly mourned.

All in all, it was tremendous fun, the kind of conflict I had in mind when I first heard about PvP battles in WoW, and not the low-impact skirmishes we get nowadays, but eh, what can you do? I'm just happy I took part in this one.

The forum thread (including some screenshots) dealing with this can be found here, and the movie page here. You can see my character a couple of times in the movie (look ma'!) though it's always at the graveyard, after I had died yet another time :P. My character is Gilraukoris, a Blood Elfette, in case you're curious.

Just Because

Heard the song on the radio a few moments ago, thought I'd post the video here.



Remember to smile, you bastards.

And I'm off

I'm still not sure what it was I wanted to write about two days ago. Probably something about Frank Sinatra and the 4-cd collection I picked up earlier this week. I guess that'll have to wait.

I finally managed to watch Stardust yesterday, I thought it was thoroughly entertaining, and not that different from the book, unlike what most people were suggesting. I'm aware of the fact that some Gaiman fanboys make the rest of us look bad. I wasn't too fond of a couple of changes (the unicorn not dying, at least it's not made clear it does, the "twist" and the overall fight at the end) but the rest all made sense from a cinematic point of view. Overall, it's exactly like the book, simple (not simplistic) but really charming.

Back in the real world, Stephen Colbert's presidential bid has been rejected by the Democrats, with a vote of 13 to 3. Boo, hiss! How could you do that to the man?

I'm leaving for my hometown in a couple of hours, so now I'll have an actual excuse for not updating for a few days. Le gasp! In the meantime, here's another video from my favorite World of Warcraft machinima series, "Snacky's Journal", Roberto's Halloween Special. It even has Sinatra!

More fedoras and whips

A new image from the upcoming Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull has been released, and that is always a cause of joy. Sadly the last image I posted here was taken down, hopefully this won't happen with this one as well.

Since the image is huge in size, I'll just post the link. Clickéz moi.

You can describe it with a mere two words: HELL. YEAH.

*ahem*

In other great news, George Lucas won't be writting the script for this one. Thank the gods.

As for recent basketball news, the NBA Europe Live Tour was completed last night, with predictable results. The Celtics were undefeated, though not as awe-inspiring as their roster would suggest, and yet another NBA team (the Grizzlies) lost to a European one (Malaga).

That's really not saying much though, as it's still the pre-season for NBA teams, and the Grizzlies are perhaps the worst team in the league. Gone are the days of the early 90's where the worst team in the league would easily defeat the European champions, the Nuggets and Toni Kukoc's Yugoplastica, respectively.

Still, there's one game I'm really looking forward for tonight; Panathinaikos against the Houston Rockets. Sadly, Vassilis Spanoulis, who last year played for the Rockets, was injured and he won't be able to play. This sucks, because former Rockets coach Jeff Van Gundy had no faith in Spanoulis last year and pretty much ended his NBA career prematurely. It'd be really interesting to see how V-Span would play against his former team.

Center Andrea Zizic was also injured and won't make tonight's game either. Doesn't look that good for my team, at the moment. As I had mentioned in a previous post, I believe we could defeat the Rockets, in a single match, during the pre-season, and with FIBA rules. Now only one of those three conditions will be true.

The game starts at 3.30AM local time (to be broadcasted on TV by ET1) so it's going to be a long night. -.- If we do win, expect an update right after the end of the match.

A change of plans

So Greece lost to Russia yesterday, after playing what was probably their worst game in like four years. Seriously, our offense was downright atrocious, and even though Russia played pretty badly, they won quite easily in the end.

I'm getting the idea that the Greek players are too tired from playing all year long since 2004. It would explain while they are so damn slow on offense, which makes them predictable, but also the defense is pretty static on defense as well. I mean, the defense is there and it's still difficult for other teams to score on us, but we don't get as many points from a steal and a fastbreak attack from our good defense, unlike what happened in the last couple of years. Fatigue is my best case as to why this is happening, but I'm hardly an expert on the subject.

For today's post I wanted to write a rant about how useless serving the army in this country is, as you only train for a month and then just clean yards and toilets, but... It felt a bit useless, as I would just be ranting, and its uselessness can be summarized in a single sentence.

So I would just be ranting for the sake of it, and while I've had a streak of bad luck lately, I think rants aren't good for much either. Plus I had decided when I started this blog that I'd stay away from the usual blog-gy rants you find on the Internets, so I'm sticking to that plan.

Instead, I'll close off this post with one of my favorite feel-good songs, from the show Animaniacs, called The Monkey Song. I always watch it whenever I need some cheering, it hasn't failed me yet.