I did give you a heart, athough I couldn't get over the shock and horror of someone who admits to not eating ice cream for dinner which you admitted to in your first sentence. Well I certainly hope that you still eat it for breakfast.
"the things I dropped, like blue jeans and snorkel coats and eating ice cream for dinner."<br>
Bad news for you, Roy: Most things come full circle in life. So I now watch my mother eating ice cream for dinner because why not? And as I approach retirement, I'm also retiring most of my business wear in favor of bluejeans and work shirts. Snorkel coats? Nah. Didn't like them when they were in vogue, and I own coats now that will keep me warm down to about 15 below zero.
Which is a good thing because this past weekend it was so cold I saw a lawyer with his hands in his own pockets!
I am nearing the age at which the US has decided that it's OK to retire (although you don't get the full SS benefit, thanks to those bastards Tip & Ronnie), and I've started eating cereals like Coco Puffs and worse (for breakfast, usually, but sometimes lunch and dinner), which I rarely did even when I was a kid (Mom was more of the forcing her kids to eat granola type). And yes, ice cream in the middle of the day, sometimes. Embracing the inner child is pretty much all that's left at this point.
Ha, calling them cat people makes me picture how good Nastassja Kinski would have looked in blue body paint.
Otherwise, I’m in general agreement. I didn’t get the 4d experience, but IMAX 3d was really impressive. It was like a big stage not three feet in front of me. And I enjoyed the world building scenes that didn’t do much to advance the narrative. I think it would have been better if the story would have been a longer form version of the kid saving the whale.
One thing I noted about the big battle scene was that the green Navi abandoned the blue once they rescued their kids. I guess they were sick of them being bad guests and left the to their fate in order to avoid the awkwardness of having to throw them out.
To tell the truth so much was happening so quickly (as often in modern film battle scenes) I didn't even notice that! But sure, that's the only reason I can think of that they wouldn't still be around, unless they were all killed, which clearly they were not. So much for "you are one of us now." Well, the Sullys still did the Green People water funeral, so I guess all is forgiven.
"...ideas about life on this planet that are not total Hollywood stoner yoga instructor eco-gibberish" is a thing of descriptive beauty.
Just to be clear, I will never, ever see this movie, you would have to Clockwork Orange me to a chair to get me to watch it, but I thoroughly enjoyed Roy's review.
But we're talking about people who can get outraged about electric stoves and not-sufficiently hot M&M's so is it really an accomplishment to count yourself as one of the billion things that set them off?
I'll probably sit through this and grudgingly enjoy it. There are plenty of times when I want something that will just rot the old brain for a few hours. Just wait a couple years until I can stream it cheap and drink beer. I can pause it for a bathroom break and not miss any of the "plot."
Still, I have a problem with the James Camerons of the world, especially when people start throwing the word "genius" around. Cameron is a technical master who can spin a yarn. But he's the fucking Antonio Salieri of front line directors. He gives the audience exactly what they want, with a nice BANG at the end so they know when to clap.
"Aliens"- (Now with more Space Marines!)
"Titanic"- Because a ship without enough lifeboats sinking into a freezing sea isn't dramatic enough. So insert a shootout on the flooding Grand Stairway. Oh and turn Lightoller into spittle-flecked loony...because why not.
"True Lies"- What the FUCK did I just watch? Much as I appreciate Jamie Lee Curtis in various states of undress, that scene snuck in from from some creepy Mitteleuropan art house shocker.
"Avatar"-So I was listening to my Yes albums and got really stoned. Like, the Roger Dean cover art came to life, man. It mixed up in my head with a mid-period Godzilla movie. Rodan was trashing Yokohama and there was an ecological message in there somewhere.
Well, he's not my favorite either. I don't know how effective the streaming experience will be unless you can get it in 3-D and have someone stand by with a spray bottle to spritz you every once in a while.
"Le Trou" is a fantastic film! Jaques Becker, the director, is great. " Casque d'Or , another of his films , is a classic.
Can't too highly recommend.
I gave up on Cameron with " True Lies" .
"Terminator" was greatest drive-in action adventure ever. "" Aliens" was the perfect
Squad level combat film. "True Lies " was ugly and gross. "Titanic" I ended up seeing on TV. Needed a bigger TV. He fell off my " make sure I watch " list before the first "Avatar."
I think True Lies might have been a labor of love for Cameron, but it comes across like a Tobe Hooper reboot of Bringing Up Baby. I still liked it, even with Tom Arnold as Arnold's straight man.
Been wondering if this was worth trying to see in a theater, something that's been problematic for me in recent years.
Around the time I hit my mid 50s, I started having trouble staying awake in movie theaters. Once the lights go down and I recline that plushly upholstered seat, I'm usually gone in 5-10 minutes.
You name it, I've slept through it. Pretty much all the big hits of the last couple of decades. I'm to the point where I rarely even bother to make the attempt. I can take a nap at home and save myself the trip and the $7 soda.
Anyway, it sounds like this might be entertaining enough to keep me awake. Guess we'll see. Thanks for the review, Roy. You put Siskel and Ebert to shame.
I have to disagree. Saw it in plain old 2D, one of my primary reactions was relief I didn't pay more to see it in some new improved SPECTACULAR format.
Well, technically you would have to see it in 3D to legitimately disagree. I’m not saying anyone should, but I was curious to see what the best technology could do and came away genuinely impressed. Don’t think I’d go for the 4D Roy saw, but maybe someday.
A perfect review for someone like me. I had a similar tits-and-lizard Frazetta design on a Nazareth t-shirt back in 79. I got suspended from school for a day after my chemistry teacher (a hardon just like Sully's nemesis!) demanded I take it off b/c it was obscene.
Hehe -- I remember that Frazetta art hardrock album cover craze... When I saw the Molly Hatchet LP with "Dark Kingdom" I remember thinking, "Do they know u can see the hero's nutsack in that outfit?"
Thanks man: I had thought the first Avatar was a candy coated thrill ride that sought validation from a vague "environmental message". I found it empty and manipulative.
If you want to go that route, the Disney Strange World is the fantasy for you: great graphics, thin plot, anvilicious message.
Never planned to see the next Avatar, though I bet the BF will insist on watching it.
"A portmanteau of anvil and delicious (or for those who are more etymologically inclined, a combination of "anvil" and "licious," which is ultimately derived from Latin meaning "luring," so it could be interpreted as anvil-luring; "delicious" by the way is ultimately from the Latin meaning "luring from"), anvilicious describes a writer's and/or director's use of an artistic element, be it line of dialogue, visual motif or plot point, to so unsubtly convey a particular message that they may as well etch it onto an anvil and drop it on your head. The term anvilicious thus qualifies as Sesquipedalian Loquaciousness.
"Heavy-handed" for the new millennium. Extreme polar opposite of subtlety. "
I haven't been to a movie theater in years because audiences behave horribly, there's always some asshole on a cell phone, or a group of people talking through the movie or rattling plastic junk food wrappers and I just can't stand it. Plus the sticky floors and the combo smell of disinfectant and popcorn in the air. I'm over movie theaters. I did love the community theaters that offered double features of older movies but those have mostly died out. And I will never see Avatar 1 or 2 because fuck no I am not sitting through the film version of what a rich guy who has everything gets for Christmas and in this case the rich guy is James Cameron gifting himself this indulgence. But I have to say I enjoyed reading your review and feel it is probably much more entertaining than the film would be for me.
"...it’s wild that Cameron came down so hard on American militarism and imperialism— and made literal billions doing it!"
I had the same thought when the first one came out, maybe it's the "billions" part that immunized him from criticism? After all Capitalism is our real God, the military is just a tool.
Now I'm thinking all CRT needs is a way to show you can get rich doing it.
There's a scene in Titanic where Rose is partying it up in Steerage with the authentic Salt Of the Earth types. Fiddles! Folk dancing! Multiple cultures! Then the perspective briefly switches over to the toffs in First Class. Brandy & cigars while someone blathers about Wall Street deregulation. Jump cut back to the Salts Of The Earth, where the party is wilder than ever.
In my fan-fic version, Cameron makes a cameo. He tells Rose & Co. that he'd love to stay down below with the fleas, boiled cabbage, and watery beer. But the Schwarzeneggers invited him to their suite for brandy & cigars, and it would be rude to not put in an appearance. "Sure, whatever," says Rose.
I rarely see movies in the theater any more (Professional obligations [& the prospect of Dev Patel's bare flank] coaxed me to "The Green Knight" in 2021 [well, three times, but once I was paid to give a talk afterwards about the experience]).
It's the offensive pricing that no manner of hi-tech seating or whatever can amend. I don't even mind audience participation -- the right crowd in the right moment reminds me that my white suburban life can be much too isolated from others -- and that heckling bad movies gives me LIFE.
It was when I realized the tickets were $15 (or whatever, I haven't been in a while) not because the theater was making a killing but bc the distributors & studios were extorting huge kickbacks (for mostly trash product) -- and that snacks were so expensive (for $10 a "large" bucket of popcorn I could bring three bags of unpopped kernels & hire a guy to make it for me right there in the theater...) because the theater makes nothing at all.
That's my view, too. Way back in the olden days, I mean way back, when I was living in Ann Arbor and working retail with odd days off, I used to go solo to the Ladies Half Price Wednesday matinee. Cheap, not crowded, although smoky in those days. I saw a lot of movies, most of which were unmemorable, except for ones like "The Panic In Needle Park", "Dog Day Afternoon", "The Conversation", and the first Godfather movie. I had an affection for Al Pacino, but that faded out completely after "Bobby Deerfield". I was poor back then, so I mostly went snackless. But I had fun.
One of my favorite art-house experiences was leaving the theater at the end of a showing of the Bogart film "Dark Passage", glancing over at one of the other movie-goers, a total stranger to me, and both of us just busting out laughing at how ridiculous the ending (and really the whole movie) was. Not a word exchanged, we both just knew what the laughs were for.
"Throw Agnes Moorhead from a window" needs to be a trope for desperate screenwriters who have written themselves into a corner and don't know how to get out.
I did give you a heart, athough I couldn't get over the shock and horror of someone who admits to not eating ice cream for dinner which you admitted to in your first sentence. Well I certainly hope that you still eat it for breakfast.
"the things I dropped, like blue jeans and snorkel coats and eating ice cream for dinner."<br>
Bad news for you, Roy: Most things come full circle in life. So I now watch my mother eating ice cream for dinner because why not? And as I approach retirement, I'm also retiring most of my business wear in favor of bluejeans and work shirts. Snorkel coats? Nah. Didn't like them when they were in vogue, and I own coats now that will keep me warm down to about 15 below zero.
Which is a good thing because this past weekend it was so cold I saw a lawyer with his hands in his own pockets!
Ba-dum-bum-CHING!
I am nearing the age at which the US has decided that it's OK to retire (although you don't get the full SS benefit, thanks to those bastards Tip & Ronnie), and I've started eating cereals like Coco Puffs and worse (for breakfast, usually, but sometimes lunch and dinner), which I rarely did even when I was a kid (Mom was more of the forcing her kids to eat granola type). And yes, ice cream in the middle of the day, sometimes. Embracing the inner child is pretty much all that's left at this point.
Ha, calling them cat people makes me picture how good Nastassja Kinski would have looked in blue body paint.
Otherwise, I’m in general agreement. I didn’t get the 4d experience, but IMAX 3d was really impressive. It was like a big stage not three feet in front of me. And I enjoyed the world building scenes that didn’t do much to advance the narrative. I think it would have been better if the story would have been a longer form version of the kid saving the whale.
One thing I noted about the big battle scene was that the green Navi abandoned the blue once they rescued their kids. I guess they were sick of them being bad guests and left the to their fate in order to avoid the awkwardness of having to throw them out.
To tell the truth so much was happening so quickly (as often in modern film battle scenes) I didn't even notice that! But sure, that's the only reason I can think of that they wouldn't still be around, unless they were all killed, which clearly they were not. So much for "you are one of us now." Well, the Sullys still did the Green People water funeral, so I guess all is forgiven.
"...ideas about life on this planet that are not total Hollywood stoner yoga instructor eco-gibberish" is a thing of descriptive beauty.
Just to be clear, I will never, ever see this movie, you would have to Clockwork Orange me to a chair to get me to watch it, but I thoroughly enjoyed Roy's review.
Same here, and think of all the time we saved! What am I gonna do with my 3 extra hours?
And that's OK.
So it’s a Disneyworld ride without the standing in line in the heat with dozens of whiny kids. Or “Dances with Smurfs - 2.”
"I didn’t laugh, and if you know me that’s saying something."
And that's why we love ya, Boss!
Gave up jeans? I never though of you as a cargo pants guy, Roy, but I guess here we are…
I don't see cargo pants, but khakis —
I wore black jeans for decades and switched to khakis when Levi's went to shit.
One word: Carhartt. Not only are they better than Levi's, Liberals wearing them is one of the many things pissing off the conservatives these days.
Truly? Nice to know I’ve been pissing off conservatives since the turn of the century
But we're talking about people who can get outraged about electric stoves and not-sufficiently hot M&M's so is it really an accomplishment to count yourself as one of the billion things that set them off?
Well no, but they are really nice jeans. Don't think they come in black though. Too bad because that might cause a few of them to have a stroke.
(Had to give up jeans because, living in the American Deep South, heat and humidity are not my friends.)
I think that's about all I need of that movie.
Good! Saved you $25.
$25 to see a movie?! Gott im Himmel
It was the full shaking-seat experience -- flat vs. may be cheaper
I'll probably sit through this and grudgingly enjoy it. There are plenty of times when I want something that will just rot the old brain for a few hours. Just wait a couple years until I can stream it cheap and drink beer. I can pause it for a bathroom break and not miss any of the "plot."
Still, I have a problem with the James Camerons of the world, especially when people start throwing the word "genius" around. Cameron is a technical master who can spin a yarn. But he's the fucking Antonio Salieri of front line directors. He gives the audience exactly what they want, with a nice BANG at the end so they know when to clap.
"Aliens"- (Now with more Space Marines!)
"Titanic"- Because a ship without enough lifeboats sinking into a freezing sea isn't dramatic enough. So insert a shootout on the flooding Grand Stairway. Oh and turn Lightoller into spittle-flecked loony...because why not.
"True Lies"- What the FUCK did I just watch? Much as I appreciate Jamie Lee Curtis in various states of undress, that scene snuck in from from some creepy Mitteleuropan art house shocker.
"Avatar"-So I was listening to my Yes albums and got really stoned. Like, the Roger Dean cover art came to life, man. It mixed up in my head with a mid-period Godzilla movie. Rodan was trashing Yokohama and there was an ecological message in there somewhere.
Well, he's not my favorite either. I don't know how effective the streaming experience will be unless you can get it in 3-D and have someone stand by with a spray bottle to spritz you every once in a while.
"Le Trou" is a fantastic film! Jaques Becker, the director, is great. " Casque d'Or , another of his films , is a classic.
Can't too highly recommend.
I gave up on Cameron with " True Lies" .
"Terminator" was greatest drive-in action adventure ever. "" Aliens" was the perfect
Squad level combat film. "True Lies " was ugly and gross. "Titanic" I ended up seeing on TV. Needed a bigger TV. He fell off my " make sure I watch " list before the first "Avatar."
Great review as always.
I think True Lies might have been a labor of love for Cameron, but it comes across like a Tobe Hooper reboot of Bringing Up Baby. I still liked it, even with Tom Arnold as Arnold's straight man.
Been wondering if this was worth trying to see in a theater, something that's been problematic for me in recent years.
Around the time I hit my mid 50s, I started having trouble staying awake in movie theaters. Once the lights go down and I recline that plushly upholstered seat, I'm usually gone in 5-10 minutes.
You name it, I've slept through it. Pretty much all the big hits of the last couple of decades. I'm to the point where I rarely even bother to make the attempt. I can take a nap at home and save myself the trip and the $7 soda.
Anyway, it sounds like this might be entertaining enough to keep me awake. Guess we'll see. Thanks for the review, Roy. You put Siskel and Ebert to shame.
Go for the IMAX 3d, or 3d at least. Without that, you might as well not bother.
I have to disagree. Saw it in plain old 2D, one of my primary reactions was relief I didn't pay more to see it in some new improved SPECTACULAR format.
Well, technically you would have to see it in 3D to legitimately disagree. I’m not saying anyone should, but I was curious to see what the best technology could do and came away genuinely impressed. Don’t think I’d go for the 4D Roy saw, but maybe someday.
Unlike last time I saw a 3d movie, I was easily able to forget about the technology. It felt totally natural.
Ha, if it were actually 4D rather than "4DX" I could have gotten the three hours back!
Wait for 4D-XXX. That'll be the end of Humanity.
Well, it's loud, anyway.
Hearted for "You name it, I've slept through it."
Which I will (slightly) reluctantly consider filching for use as my motto.
A perfect review for someone like me. I had a similar tits-and-lizard Frazetta design on a Nazareth t-shirt back in 79. I got suspended from school for a day after my chemistry teacher (a hardon just like Sully's nemesis!) demanded I take it off b/c it was obscene.
Hehe -- I remember that Frazetta art hardrock album cover craze... When I saw the Molly Hatchet LP with "Dark Kingdom" I remember thinking, "Do they know u can see the hero's nutsack in that outfit?"
In case u didn't grow up enthalled by Frazetta's high fantasy paintings:*
https://www.wikiart.org/en/frank-frazetta/dark-kingdom
* And loathed Boris Vallejo for being a fucking clapboard hack
Thanks man: I had thought the first Avatar was a candy coated thrill ride that sought validation from a vague "environmental message". I found it empty and manipulative.
If you want to go that route, the Disney Strange World is the fantasy for you: great graphics, thin plot, anvilicious message.
Never planned to see the next Avatar, though I bet the BF will insist on watching it.
Hey, thanks for "anvicilious", never heard it before, but it's perfect for so many occasions!
yeah, me neither!
"It's TvTropes, Jake..."
"A portmanteau of anvil and delicious (or for those who are more etymologically inclined, a combination of "anvil" and "licious," which is ultimately derived from Latin meaning "luring," so it could be interpreted as anvil-luring; "delicious" by the way is ultimately from the Latin meaning "luring from"), anvilicious describes a writer's and/or director's use of an artistic element, be it line of dialogue, visual motif or plot point, to so unsubtly convey a particular message that they may as well etch it onto an anvil and drop it on your head. The term anvilicious thus qualifies as Sesquipedalian Loquaciousness.
"Heavy-handed" for the new millennium. Extreme polar opposite of subtlety. "
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/Anvilicious
Illustrated with a falling anvil labeled "Moral"
As in all things, Looney Toons did it better, just make it a literal anvil.
Sooooooo glad you watched this, Roy. Because now I don’t have to.
It's like reading Ross Douthat, but with movies!
Happy to help!
I haven't been to a movie theater in years because audiences behave horribly, there's always some asshole on a cell phone, or a group of people talking through the movie or rattling plastic junk food wrappers and I just can't stand it. Plus the sticky floors and the combo smell of disinfectant and popcorn in the air. I'm over movie theaters. I did love the community theaters that offered double features of older movies but those have mostly died out. And I will never see Avatar 1 or 2 because fuck no I am not sitting through the film version of what a rich guy who has everything gets for Christmas and in this case the rich guy is James Cameron gifting himself this indulgence. But I have to say I enjoyed reading your review and feel it is probably much more entertaining than the film would be for me.
"...it’s wild that Cameron came down so hard on American militarism and imperialism— and made literal billions doing it!"
I had the same thought when the first one came out, maybe it's the "billions" part that immunized him from criticism? After all Capitalism is our real God, the military is just a tool.
Now I'm thinking all CRT needs is a way to show you can get rich doing it.
There's a scene in Titanic where Rose is partying it up in Steerage with the authentic Salt Of the Earth types. Fiddles! Folk dancing! Multiple cultures! Then the perspective briefly switches over to the toffs in First Class. Brandy & cigars while someone blathers about Wall Street deregulation. Jump cut back to the Salts Of The Earth, where the party is wilder than ever.
In my fan-fic version, Cameron makes a cameo. He tells Rose & Co. that he'd love to stay down below with the fleas, boiled cabbage, and watery beer. But the Schwarzeneggers invited him to their suite for brandy & cigars, and it would be rude to not put in an appearance. "Sure, whatever," says Rose.
Ah yes, "The poor have so much more fun than the rich", that's been a reliable movie trope since the days of Capra, and probably even before that.
Come si, come sa.
Come see.
Came, saw.
I rarely see movies in the theater any more (Professional obligations [& the prospect of Dev Patel's bare flank] coaxed me to "The Green Knight" in 2021 [well, three times, but once I was paid to give a talk afterwards about the experience]).
It's the offensive pricing that no manner of hi-tech seating or whatever can amend. I don't even mind audience participation -- the right crowd in the right moment reminds me that my white suburban life can be much too isolated from others -- and that heckling bad movies gives me LIFE.
It was when I realized the tickets were $15 (or whatever, I haven't been in a while) not because the theater was making a killing but bc the distributors & studios were extorting huge kickbacks (for mostly trash product) -- and that snacks were so expensive (for $10 a "large" bucket of popcorn I could bring three bags of unpopped kernels & hire a guy to make it for me right there in the theater...) because the theater makes nothing at all.
That's my view, too. Way back in the olden days, I mean way back, when I was living in Ann Arbor and working retail with odd days off, I used to go solo to the Ladies Half Price Wednesday matinee. Cheap, not crowded, although smoky in those days. I saw a lot of movies, most of which were unmemorable, except for ones like "The Panic In Needle Park", "Dog Day Afternoon", "The Conversation", and the first Godfather movie. I had an affection for Al Pacino, but that faded out completely after "Bobby Deerfield". I was poor back then, so I mostly went snackless. But I had fun.
Recession pricing in the Dead Hollywood era! Can't beat it.
One of my favorite art-house experiences was leaving the theater at the end of a showing of the Bogart film "Dark Passage", glancing over at one of the other movie-goers, a total stranger to me, and both of us just busting out laughing at how ridiculous the ending (and really the whole movie) was. Not a word exchanged, we both just knew what the laughs were for.
"Throw Agnes Moorhead from a window" needs to be a trope for desperate screenwriters who have written themselves into a corner and don't know how to get out.